Bill's Ponderings

There is no iTeam

2011-10-07T07:00:00.000-07:00

As you are probably quite aware, Steve Jobs passed away. The news of his passing has been everywhere. Steve brought us many innovations through the years. Not just mundane products and innovations, he brought us products and innovations that people loved a great deal. So naturally people have been commenting on his passing.

One thing I can’t help but notice is that everyone attributes every innovation from Apple to Steve Jobs. I admit that I do not know exactly how they dream up and design new products at Apple. But I’m pretty sure Steve didn’t design every circuit, he didn’t write every line of code, he didn’t design every cool looking case. He had help. Probably lots of help from teams of committed engineers. Steve seemed to be the vision caster, but those products probably wouldn’t have come to be if there wasn’t a team of people working on them. But that team largely gets ignored. Lost in the shadow cast by Steve Jobs.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got nothing against Steve Jobs. He did help shape technology over the past several decades. But if it was all Steve, Apple is in trouble now. If it was a team, then they are much more likely to be able to continue to innovate and bring cool products to the market.

Though one may be overpowered,
two can defend themselves.
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
Ecclesiastes 4:12 (New International Version)

Are you a one man (or woman) show? Or are you building a team? That’s worth pondering about…

But, I don’t want to….

2011-09-26T06:00:00.000-07:00

Most of us have had to go to a function that we didn't want to attend. Maybe it was a work thing that we didn't feel like being at. Maybe it was some family event, like your spoiled nephew’s or niece’s birthday. Maybe it was an event with people you don’t even know, like when your spouse needs to go to a wedding for one of their friends and you won’t know anyone there. You start dreading going. Your mind starts telling you how much you’re going to hate the event. How boring it’s going to be. How much you’d rather be doing something else. It’s just like a big, dark cloud on that date. You might even wake up in a bad mood because it’s the day of the [insert ominous music here] dreaded event.

Usually when this happens to me, the event is not nearly as bad as I imagined it would be. You might end up at the good table with some friendly people and actually have a good time. Who would have thought that was possible? Occasionally, the event is as bad as you thought it would be – but in my experience, it’s usually not. We build up the possible things that could go wrong that we won’t like and make it much worse in our minds than it really is.

We do this with more than just work functions, family get-togethers and weddings. Have you ever dreaded going to the doctor or the dentist? I’m sure we’ve all looked forward to cleaning out the garage or that junk room/closet. Sometimes even the mundane chores like doing the dishes or getting your car smogged can be an exercise in procrastination.

I suspect there are many reasons for why we do this. There’s probably nearly as many reasons as there are people. But I wonder how much easier our lives would be if didn’t make mountains out of molehills. What if we didn’t dread going to these events so much? What if we tried to look forward to these things? What if they were opportunities to have some fun instead of something to dread? What if they were opportunities to make a new friend instead of something to endure? What if they were opportunities to show a loving and kind spirit instead of getting into the usual family argument? What if they were an opportunity to show God’s love? I think that would change a lot of things. It would probably make our lives a quite a bit easier. We’d probably be a bit closer to the kind of attitude Jesus would have. And we might even help bring someone to Jesus.

Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Romans 12:12 (NIV)

Can you change the way you think about things you don’t want to do? That’s worth pondering about….

Just for Fun

2011-06-13T16:11:00.000-07:00

This guy is pretty talented.

Perspective Matters

2011-06-06T21:40:00.000-07:00

Thanks Mom and Dad!

I was at a high school graduation today. That in itself is not all that interesting. There’s an almost uncountable number of graduations going on this time year. The graduation I attended was for a smaller, Christian school. If you never been to a graduation at one, it’s quite a different experience than the megalopolis high school graduation. The smaller school is able to do something things that just aren't possible when hundreds and hundreds of students are graduating.

One part of these smaller graduations I like is when the students have a moment to thank their parents. Today this was done via pre-recorded video messages. Some of the students are heartfelt in their thanks and some are humorous. But what is constant in nearly all of them is theme of “how far we’ve come.” The graduates talk about “having made it all this way,” or “you’ve really supported me in this long journey,” or some such statement. Those comments always make me smile.

I’m sure to the 18 year old graduate, it does seem like a long journey to graduation. After all, it’s been their whole life. However, to those of us who are a little, well, ummm, a little more seasoned - 18 years just doesn’t seem like that long of a journey. Perspective matters. Those 'long' 18 years don't seem so long when you are two or three times older than that. I'm sure the grandparents in the audience really understand that irony.

It made me think about how God must view my few short years. I wonder if he smiles just a little bit when I remind him how long I’ve been waiting for something. How short my few years must seem in compared to all eternity. But I think the real issue is not for God to understand my impatience and my short time line view, but for me to try to grasp God’s timing.

Are you stuck on your short time span? Or are you considering God’s much longer time span? That’s worth pondering about.

And congratulations to the class of 2011. May God bless and direct your paths.

That Doesn’t Look Right to Me!

2011-05-10T06:00:00.000-07:00

Have you ever noticed when things just seem wrong? Maybe it’s something that you’re not very knowledgeable about, but it still doesn’t ‘look right’ too you. Recently I noticed a transition ramp between two freeways. This ramp takes you from a lower freeway up to the freeway that is crossing over the first one. If you are local in So Cal, it’s the 605 S to the 91 W. This particular transition ramp is on top of a large berm of dirt to help it rise to the higher 91 freeway. However, the drop off is very steep, nearly vertical.

What’s weird about this whole thing is, there is a guardrail on the inside of the turn on the transition ramp, but not the outside of the turn. That just doesn’t seem right to me. I’m not an expert on such things, but I’ve never seen a car miss a turn because they turned too sharply. Generally they are going too fast and go off the outside edge of the turn. If it’s raining and slippery, the car isn’t going to slide off the inside of the turn (this transition ramp has nearly no banking), the car is going to slide off the outside of the turn, where there is no guardrail. It just doesn’t seem right to me.

I guess I’m supposed to trust Cal Trans and their experts that they know what they are doing and a guardrail is not need in that spot. But that’s kind of tough to do. Because right where this transition ramp joins the 91 freeway, I’ve only got a few car lengths to merge through 5 lanes of traffic to make it to the carpool lane. That monster merge turns out to be fairly challenging most days. If the people designing this couldn’t see that this arrangement was going to make those merges really hard and move the carpool entrance a few feet further down the freeway – how am I supposed to trust them that they know where a guardrail should be? You’ve got to be able to handle the small things (where the carpool entrance should be) before I’ll trust you with the big things (safety).

I’ve seen this same principle at work in spiritual matters. Someone reads a story about having strong faith and they want a deep faith like that too. So they attempt to trust God with something. Generally with something big and heavy. And if things don’t turn out just exactly like they wanted, their faith in God is shattered. But it was a fragile faith to begin with. Because it was not grounded in a lot of small things, but perched on top of one big thing. That just doesn’t seem right to me. A strong, dynamic faith is grounded in a ponderance of small, little things. That’s what makes it strong, many data points. Consider the example Jesus used to demonstrate faithfulness.

You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness! Matthew 25:21 (NIV)

How is your faith? Is it grounded in the little things? Or just balanced, precariously, on one big thing?

That’s worth pondering about.

3 Reasons Why Friday is the Best Day of the Week

2011-04-26T05:00:00.000-07:00

I love Fridays. That's not unusual. Nearly everyone who works in an office all week long loves Friday. It's the end of the work week. The beginning of the weekend. Time for some R and R. T.G.I.F. We all know the drill about Fridays.

I certainly like those things about Fridays too. But that's not the real reason I love Friday. I really love Friday because on nearly every Friday night of the year, I get together with 8 of my friends for band practice. Yup, that's right, I absolutely love band practice. Weird, huh? This particular band practice is for the worship team at our church on Saturday mornings. Even when the week has been long and tiring, I look forward to band practice. It's rejuvenating. It's fun. It restores me. It's hard to describe why all these things are true. It's many, many reasons and factors, but I'll keep it to just 3 for now.

1. I love music. I always have and suspect I always will. Music is unique in the way it works within us. Words and logic are useful in expressing ideas. Pictures are worth a thousand words. But music trumps them all. It has the ability make us feel. Music has the unique ability to lift my spirits without all the side effects of caffeine or an energy drink. I could go on and on about why I love music and all its endearing qualities. So I guess I'll just leave it at, I really love music. Getting together on Friday evening with my friends to make some music is one of the highlights of the week. Sometimes I enjoy practice more than playing at church. At practice there's no pressure and we have a lot of fun. We try different things, mess around. It's great. Playing for the worship service is wonderful, but it's more structured, and not quite as freeing as just playing at practice.

2. I love my band mates. Seriously. The folks in our praise band at church are great people. I like spending time with them. It's fun. It's uplifting. We don't have a lot of problems with attitudes or whatever. If you've ever been in a small group and you've enjoyed the fellowship, then you know what I'm talking about. Some of the people in the group I've known for many years and some of the people I've only known a few years. Yet, we all get along like we've been friends for decades. I look forward to spending time with these people. It makes ministry fun when you are serving with people you like.

3. I love God. That's easy to say, or put on a t-shirt or bumper sticker. But sometimes it's pretty hard to figure out what we are supposed to do to show that we love God. We try all kinds of things, like good works, Bible reading, study time, prayer, the list is long of things we try to do to show our love. These things can be good and worthy. But for me, music is such a simple way to show how much I love God. I sing his praise. Not only do I sing, but I encourage others to sing it too. Music helps open our hearts to God. It prepares us as we enter into his presence. Yes, all the parts of a worship service are important. The Bible readings, the prayers, the sermon, the giving, it all works together. But I just can't imagine a worship being effective without music. I know it wouldn't work for me. Music begins and ends the service. It's the bookends that hold the whole thing together.

Do you look forward to the time when you are serving in your ministry? If not, why not? Do you love what you're doing for God? Do you love the people you are serving with? If the answer is no, how are you going to change that?

That's worth pondering about.

What a Coincidence

2011-04-04T06:00:00.000-07:00

I tend to notice coincidences. Unique little quirky things that happen seem to get my attention. Patterns also jump out at me. I don't know why, they just do. I notice when numbers line up in a pattern. I notice when an unusual number of the same make of car are around me as I drive. There's a thousand and one little things that happen like that seem to be grabbing for my attention. The other thing I've noticed, is that most people don't notice these things, and really don't care when I point them out.

However the other day there was one that really kind of tickled me. I was driving in my truck, when I noticed two Cadillacs in front of me. Side by side, going down the street in front of me. They were the same model and roughly the same year. Certainly the same body style. That's the kind of little thing that I regularly notice, but that in itself was not the interesting part. One car was driven by an elderly gentleman and, what I presume to be his wife, was in the front with him. They were what I consider the typical Cadillac driver. They were nicely dressed. They sat up nice and straight in their seats. They almost looked regal, like they were going out somewhere. The other car was a completely different story. It contained 4 young men who looked like gang members, or at least wanna be's. They all slouched and leaned over as they were attempting to be cool. Their clothes consisted of white tank top t-shirts, and flannel shirts. Two of them had bandannas on their heads.

The occupants of these two very similar cars were about as different as they could be. Opposite ends of the spectrum is how they might be described. I suspect they picked similar vehicles for very different reasons. Yet the same vehicle was meeting the needs of these very different groups. I wonder if Cadillac considers both groups when designing their cars? That seems unlikely.

In a small way, this reminds me of God. God is the same for everyone, yet some how he's able to meet the needs of some very diverse people and groups. He doesn't need to change for you or me or anyone. He's able to provide for all of us.

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Hebrews 13:8 (NIV)

Are you willing to give him a try? I mean really try it. Let him help with some of the hard problems in life. That's worth pondering about...

An Engineer's Thoughts About Christmas

2010-12-23T15:51:00.000-08:00

A repost from a few years ago. Maybe it will be new for someone. Merry Christmas.

There are approximately 378 million Christian children in the world according to the Population Reference Bureau. At an average census rate of 3.5 children per household that comes to 108 million homes, presuming that there is at least one good child in each.

Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west. This works out to 967.7 visits per second. This is to say that for each household with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000th of a second to park the sleigh; hop out; jump down the chimney; fill the stockings; distribute the remaining presents under the tree; eat whatever snacks have been left for him; get back up the chimney; jump into the sleigh; and get on to the next house.

Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed around the earth which, of course, we know to be false, but will accept for the purposes of our calculations, we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household--a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second--3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second, and a conventional reindeer can run at best 15 miles per hour.

The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized Lego set weighing two pounds, the sleigh is carrying over 500,000 tons, not counting Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that the flying reindeer could pull ten times the normal amount, the job can't be done with nine of them--Santa would need 360,000 of them. This increases the payload, not counting the weight of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth, the ship not the monarch.

Six hundred thousand tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance--this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer would absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously. The entire reindeer team would be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip.

Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result of acceleration from a dead stop to 650 miles per second in one-thousandth of a second, would be subjected to centrifugal forces of 17,500 g's. A 250 pound Santa which seems ludicrously slim would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by 4.3 millions pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo.

Therefore, if Santa did exist, he's dead now.

Merry Christmas!

50,000 Rockets

2010-08-23T07:00:00.000-07:00

This looks like a fun celebration. What's not to like about 50,000 handmade rockets. We need some celebrations like this here. I'm thinking we could work this into the 4th of July somehow.

Greek Rocket War
Uploaded by DiagonalView. - Sitcom, sketch, and standup comedy videos.

Truth Is

2010-08-18T12:25:00.000-07:00

People have been arguing, oops debating, what happens to people when they die for centuries. Some think you go to heaven or hell. Some believe you are re-incarnated. Some think nothing happens. And there are many other variations too.

However, all of those options cannot be true. Only one is true. There are not all of these alternate realities so Christians can go to heaven or hell and atheists can take a big dirt nap and other people can be reincarnated and so on. Only one of those options will happen. We can debate which one is true until we are blue in the face. But it will be difficult, if not impossible, to scientifically prove what fate awaits us when we die. But that doesn't change the fact that one of those options is true and others are not true. Because 'truth is.' Truth exists regardless of what you or I believe. 2 + 2 = 4 whether or not I believe it to be true. Because 'truth is.' I can believe there is no God, but that doesn't change the fact of whether there is or is not a God. Because 'truth is.'

Have you seriously considered what will happen when you die? It is something worth thinking about. If you come to the conclusion that heaven is a possibility, are you taking the necessary steps now to make certain that's where you will spend eternity? That's worth pondering about...

"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going." John 14:1-4 (NIV)

Typography and Conviction

2010-08-16T07:00:00.000-07:00

Great video showing some very cool typography. Not only that, this really hits home a point about speaking with authority and conviction.

Typography from Ronnie Bruce on Vimeo.

How much conviction and authority do you speak with? That's worth pondering about.

25 years

2010-08-11T07:00:00.000-07:00

Today is my 25th wedding anniversary. It's hard to believe that 25 years has gone by so fast. It's hard to believe that I'm old enough to have been married 25 years.

It's been a great ride Linda. I love you more each day.

Cool Guitar Playing

2010-08-09T07:00:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting little bit of guitar playing. He really gets going toward the middle of the video.

GroovyGrooves.com - The Grooviest Dancing, Singing, and Musician Videos

Except for Just One Thing...

2010-06-14T06:00:00.000-07:00

Have you ever used a product that was so close to being just perfect for it's intended use, except for just one thing. That's a big "except," isn't it?

Here's an example. One of the companies that we buy food for our two birds from packages their product in a wonderfully thick plastic bag with a heavy duty zip lock top. This is awesome as it can be difficult to keep bugs out of the bird seed. But there is just one thing. (Isn't there always?) The opening of the bag is too small. So when the bag gets about half empty you can't fit your hand in the bag with a little scooper to get food out. What I end up with a product, with it's packaging, that is so close to perfect. Yet a simple defect makes it so difficult to use that we only purchase that product as a last resort.

It's a great bike, except for just one thing...

As an engineer it just drives me crazy that something could be so close to perfection and yet so far. I wish someone had just done a little testing. And there are plenty of more issues like this in products we use daily. It drives me nuts. Yet we as the customer allow companies to sell us items that aren't as good as they could/should be, because we keep buying them. We should hold these companies to a higher standard.

The only place that I know of where you won't get the "except for just one thing" is with God. Products have their exceptions. "It's a really great car, except...." The software that we use has its exceptions. "This is a great program, except I can't figure out how to ...." Our friends have exceptions. Religion certainly has it's exceptions. God does not have exceptions.

"I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty." Revelation 1:8

Have you tried God? Or are you basing your beliefs on what someone else told you? God has no exceptions. He can handle all the problems. God doesn't promise us a perfect life. Be he is the beginning and the end and everything in between. Are you willing to turn your problems and exceptions over to him? That's worth pondering about.

Bad Logic

2010-05-24T07:00:00.000-07:00

One of the things that always gets me, is when someone used bad logic to make a good point. Like somehow that makes it OK.

A classic example is "You have two ears, but only one mouth. So it's more important to listen than to talk." NO! You have two ears because God is wise and understands physics. Two ears allow stereo hearing which enables you to tell the direction a sound is coming from. That's a very useful thing. Two eyes allow stereo vision which enables depth of field. It has nothing to do with what's more important. Now, don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with listening. It's a valuable skill. But it's not more important because you have more ears than mouths. Using that logic, walking is more important than thinking because you have two legs and only one brain. Grabbing someone is better than hugging someone because I have 10 fingers and only two arms. Yea, that doesn't work.

Sometimes we ignore good logic and listen to really bad advice. Usually because we want to do something and we really aren't looking for advice, we are looking for affirmation. So we rationalize and ignore good logic to accept the bad logic. It's bad enough that we can be our own problem when trying to use reason to come to a good conclusion, but sometimes people in positions of influence intentionally try to obscure the truth with bad logic and bad advice. It's enough to confuse anyone.

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline. Proverbs 1:7

Who are you listening too? Have you carefully evaluated whether they have your best interest at heart? That's worth pondering about....

Size matters....

2010-05-09T07:00:00.000-07:00

I don't know how my wife does it. She can walk into a clothing store and go to any type of clothing, pick up her size, take it home and it fits. It doesn't matter if it's jeans, shorts, skirts or tops. It's always the same. She just holds it up and somehow declares this will fit and it does. It is amazing.

I on the other hand, know the exact manufacture of my jeans AND the exact model AND the exact size and can't get them to fit. I don't understand how I can take off my old jeans, put on the exact same make, model and size and have them fit differently. They will be too long, too short, too big, too small, too something. It drives me nuts. I have shoes, that I regularly wear, that range from size 10.5 to 12. That's not even close to the same. I've been buying the same brand of walking shoes for a while. Last time I went to the store I had to get them a size and half larger so they would fit. I'm pretty sure my foot is not longer than it used to be.

This just frustrates me to no end, which is why I hate shopping for clothes. Congress should be doing something about this catastrophe!

Size matters. It matters in more than just our clothes. It matters in our living quarters. It matters in personal space. It matters in the garage/storage unit. It matters on our hard disk. It matters in our TV size. It matters in the amount of food we get for a meal. It matters when we select a church to belong too. Size matters in a lot of places. When the size is right, we don't even think about it. It's just so perfect it's not even something that crosses our mind. When it's wrong, it is so frustrating and it drives us nuts.

Fortunately God understands that.

"And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered." Matt 10:30 (NIV)

If he's got the hair on your head numbered, he won't get the size wrong. Don't fall into the trap of thinking something is too big, or too small, for God to be concerned about. What is the thing that you are dealing with that you are concerned God won't help you with? The thing that you feel like you need to deal with on your own. That's worth pondering about....

Rigged

2010-04-25T13:54:00.000-07:00

I was filling out one of those online satisfaction surveys that has a possibility to win some grandiose prize (ok, it was just an iPod). The game has one of those spinny wheel thingies that will tell you if you've won. I give it a spin and before it's finished spinning and I know the results, I have an email telling me I didn't win.

I can safely assume it is rigged.

Patience is ....

2010-03-29T06:01:00.000-07:00

over-rated. I need some patience and I need it now! Seriously though, you've probably heard that "patience is a virtue." I guess that's why it can be quite difficult for me to have patience, I'm just not that virtuous some days.

What can really make it hard for me to be patient, is incompetence. It frustrates me to no end when I'm dealing with someone who is just plain old incompetent. It's even worse when you are paying for the privilege of dealing this with this individual. Business and organizations that want me to spend money with them, but then hire people who are incapable of doing the job just drive me crazy.

I recently had way too much fun with the L.A. World Honda dealer. We've been getting our cars serviced there for quite a while. To make a long story short, they really screwed up and wanted me to pay nearly $4000 to fix their mistake. Can you say "forget that"? I told the service rep that their mess up was going to cost them way more than $4000, because I was going to take my three Hondas somewhere else from now on. They'd more than recoup their money if they fixed their mistake and made it right. They didn't want anything to do with it. Maybe my 3 little Hondas just aren't enough to affect them, I don't know. But in any case, I'm done with them. I found another shop to fix their mistake and it only cost me $2500. (I still think the dealer should have fixed it for free...) But if you need a great transmission shop, I HIGHLY recommend Stu's Transmission on Cherry Ave in Long Beach, CA. Great place. Oh and did I mention that you should avoid L.A. World Honda like it's the plague? But in all the hassle, I had to learn to be patient -- once again. It wasn't easy because I really wanted to choke someone.

Why is it harder to act like a responsible, decent human being, than it is to be a complete jerk? Maybe because we are all a little weird and dysfunctional. Maybe because it's just easier to take the low road instead of the high road. Maybe because we think expressing some of our frustration will make everything better - or at least make us feel better. Neither of which is true in my experience. So I guess I need to continue to work on my patience. Sigh....

What virtue do you need to work on? That's worth pondering about.

Overhaul

2010-03-16T21:42:00.000-07:00

Blogger has rolled out a new tool for updating the look and feel of your blog. I was so impressed with their new template designer that I got all inspired and stuff and put a new virtual coat of paint on the place. Their tool is so easy to use, I could update the look every week. Ok, maybe that's not the best idea. But if you have a blog on Blogger, I highly suggest you check it out.

People are......

2010-03-08T07:15:00.000-08:00

weird. Yup, that's right people are weird. All people are weird. Some are weirder than others. And what's weird to some, might not be weird to others. But in one way or another, we are a little weird.

Here's a recent example in my little world...

I was going into work one morning and a woman entered using a different entrance about the same time. In this particular building you have to sign in if you arrive before 7am. She looks at me and realizes I'm going to make it to the sign-in book before she is. Apparently this is a big problem for her and she actually starts running to make it to the book before I do. So there she is running across the lobby in her high heels to make to the to sign-in book before the guy with the motorcycle helmet in his hand. Definitely weird, but no biggie - I wasn't in that much of a hurry to get to work. However, when she got to the sign-in book, she wrote her name with... well I don't really know how to describe it, I guess I'll just say with much flair and dignity. I am not sure why, maybe she's recently taken some calligraphy classes at the local adult night school and she wants to get her monies worth. Anyway, it took her like a minute and half to write her name, the time and the company she works for. It took me like 10 seconds. So she ran to get in front of me to write slowly and take her time. The whole thing was just weird.... especially for 6am in the morning.

Obviously, this is not a major event, but it illustrates the point well. We all do weird things. Things that from other people's point of view - make no sense at all. I'm sure that woman had a good reason, at least to her, for her weird behavior - but that reason completely alludes me. It's just weird.

So the next time some disappoints you, or hurts your feelings or is just plain old strange - remember that people are weird. ALL people are weird. And that includes you too.

Rule Followers

2010-02-28T13:00:00.000-08:00

Have you ever met someone who HAS to follow the rules? Always. Everytime. No room for just winging it a bit. These are the people who can't just pick up a game and play it. They have to read every single rule and follow them precisly and exactly or they won't play. They can't just play a game for the fun of it. Those people can be bit annoying sometimes.

Now, don't get me wrong. It's good to have rules and it's good to follow those rules. I'm glad we have rules for driving and that most people follow them. That's good stuff. But sometimes people use rules as an excuse to do things a certain way - mostly so they won't have to think. If you have a procedure to follow at work for something and you want to trying improve the process - the rule followers will fight you all the way. Again, it's good to have some rules at work. There are somethings that just have to to be done. But when you are trying to improve the process or sometimes even just get by as best you can in the current situation, the rule followers can be a big pain. They will complain that you are doing it wrong and just generally be a pain in the neck. Of course, they rarely have any positive suggestions for improvement.

Listen to what they have to say, but if they are just complaining to complain - or they are just complaining because you aren't follow the rules, don't let them get to you. You've got a better idea. Keep after it. Don't let the stone throwers stop you. After all, nothing would ever get invented or improved if we all did everything the same way all the time.

What's your idea? Are you keeping after it? That's worth pondering about....

A Good Thing or a Bad Thing?

2010-02-09T21:47:00.000-08:00

When you get to work and the security guard tells you that only one of the 4 elevators in the building is working, is that a good thing or a bad thing?

It's good because I was at work earlier than most and there wasn't a huge demand for that one elevator.
It's bad because I wondered what my odds of getting stuck in the last elevator in a failing system are.

It's good because I didn't have to take the stairs to my floor.
It's bad because I didn't get the exercise of taking the stairs.

It's good because I safely arrived at my floor.
It's bad because I wonder how poorly our elevators were made and how poorly they are maintained.

Most of what happens to us in a our daily lives has a good side and a bad side. The question is, what side do you spend the most time dwelling on? That's worth pondering about....

Rain, Response and Re-Think

2010-01-27T17:54:00.000-08:00

Rain in So Cal is a funny thing. For one thing, it makes the native Californians a little crazy. Secondly, it makes the transplanted Californians remember other places they lived with rain – sometimes with fond memories, sometimes it re-enforces why they moved. Thirdly, it never just rains in So Cal. It's always a storm. The local news goes crazy with “StormWatch.” They put our all their reporters out in various locales so they can comment on whether or not any moisture is falling from the sky yet. Sometimes it’s almost too much.

But the one place that rain really messes up, is the freeways. When it rains in So Cal, it divides people into two groups. Those who don’t slow down one bit and those who nearly stop completely. Neither of these options is the appropriate response. When the roads get slick from the rain, it’s a good idea to slow down some and take it easy. That doesn’t mean business as usual at 80 miles an hour. Nor does it mean that you should go 10 miles an hour on the freeway because there’s a light mist falling. (Does it make me a bad person to enjoying seeing the yahoo who went by at 80 facing the wrong way against the center divider a few miles later?)

Appropriate response is a good thing. Whether you are dealing with disciplining a wayward child, or dealing with an organization that has provided a poor service for your money, or dealing with a perceived slight from a co-worker or family member - take a moment to think about the appropriate response BEFORE you act. Maybe now is the time to re-think your response regarding spiritual matters as well. Have you responded appropriately to God's calling? That's worth pondering about....

Opposites Attract

2010-01-18T07:00:00.000-08:00

We seem to love things that are opposites of each other. Sweet and Sour Chicken is a great example. We put "hot" chocolate on "cold" ice cream. If we get dressed up, we often where black and white. Snacks are often sweet and salty or sour and sweet. We like to jump out of a hot tub into a cool pool. And "good" girls like to date "bad" boys. Some "good" people like to dress up like big, "bad" bikers and go to the local bar on weekends.

Those last ones open up a whole area of strange human behavior. Many times we like to be a little bad. We don't want to kill anyone or go to jail, but we like to be bad - a little bit. We just want to have some fun. I think sometimes this how people get into big trouble without really realizing what's going on. One classic example is cheating on your spouse. It's naughty and often times we think it will be a little fun and no one will really get hurt. We won't go to jail. It just a fun way to be a little bad. Ask Tiger Woods how that's working out for him. There's many other examples of this type of behavior.

It's like we are trying to have everything. We want to be bad and good. We want the respect of being a good person and we don't want the cops to harrass us, but we also like the alure of being a little bad. Why be a fence sitter? You can drive yourself crazy trying to lead a double life. It doesn't seem to be worth the headache. Can you imagine anyone at the end of their life wishing that had just been a little more bad? Me neither. So why bother with it? That's worth pondering about...

But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve... But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD. Joshua 24:15 (NIV)

Obvious Moments

2010-01-12T19:56:00.000-08:00

Parents of young children often worry about child care. When our children were young, me and my wife were no different. We both worked and so at one point when our babysitter couldn't continue, we worried about what we were going to do. We were very blessed to find a wonderful family at church that was able to watch the boys. They stayed with this family the entire time until they started going to school. It was a great situation for us, and hopefully the other family. I guess they survived our boys, as we have remained close to this family these many years later.

At a recent event, I was introduced to an extended family member of this family. I had never met this man before, but he had often been to the house where they watched the boys and he remembered them. After we talked for a few minutes, he mentioned that often saw the boys on the way home from school on the bus. He remembered the boys well. The boys didn't remember him or recognize him. But he remembered them and would watch them on the bus each day with their friends.

At first glance this seems like a neat coincidence. But I believe it was more than that. Like many parents, I have often prayed for the safety of my boys. God seems to have answered my prayers. But now it seems that God has reminded me that he did answer my prayers. He provided a man who knew my boys, that the boys didn't remember and whom I had never met, who was on the bus each day with them. Someone, who if needed, would have stepped up to help my boys.

I have a friend who says "God is good all the time, and sometimes it's really obvious." I love those obvious moments. Those moments don't always happen as often as I'd like them to. But when they do it is so cool!

Sometimes I wonder what I've done to deserve such favor from God. Then I remember, I haven't done anything. God loves me and provides for me as a good father cares for his children. Not because I am great, but because He is great.

What's Important?

2010-01-09T09:51:00.000-08:00

This holiday season was quite a bit different than I expected. I was expecting a regular holiday. We have a bit of routine down and it's good. I was going to get some time off and do a few minor projects around the house. Just kind of lay low and enjoy the time off. It didn't really work out that way, but I'm ok with that.

However, part of the holiday was really unique, and dare I say it, even special. It was totally unexpected. Without going into all the details, several times during this holiday people did something or shared something with me and my family that was very thoughtful. We got one card from someone who really took their time to write something very nice and uplifting. We were invited to share the evening with some friends. Someone shared something with me about what had made their year one of the best ever. Just some little things. Nothing big. Certainly nothing expensive. But that's what made it so cool. It was personal. These things probably wouldn't mean much to anyone else, because they were custom tailored for me.

It really made me reflect on what is important. I tend to be very task oriented. I guess that's not all bad, someone has to get stuff done. But I need to be careful not to be only task oriented. Tasks don’t matter near as much as people do. I know that, but I’m afraid I don’t always act like that.

Take the time to be part of the lives of the people around you. Think about where you, your family and your friends are headed – not only in this life, but for eternity. When you are part of someone’s life, you have influence. You can make suggestions that could help in the course of their life. That’s a good thing. The question is, what suggestions are you making? What course adjustments are you responsible for? That’s worth pondering about.

Silly Questions

2009-12-31T08:32:00.001-08:00

I was at the store buying a new computer the other day. I had already done my research and was pretty much ready to buy. I was just doing some final checking and comparisons on what was available.

After standing in front of various computers for 15 minutes or so, a sales lady approached and asked if I was interested in getting a computer. Now I suppose they have to ask the question because they get lots of looky-loos. But when you do want to buy a computer, it's a goofy question. I'm standing there thinking, "Yes, I want to buy a computer, that's why I'm standing in front of the computers."

Then she spent the next few minutes telling me how this other computer was better. It wasn't. It was slightly cheaper. But it had a smaller hard disk, a slower processor and less memory. The kicker was, after spending several minutes telling me how much better that computer was, she said "But we don't have this one is stock anyway." Huh?! You just spent your time telling me about a computer you don't have? Why?!

To her credit, she did tell me about a sale on some monitors, so I got two 24 inch monitors for just few dollars more than one 27 inch monitor. That was a no brainer.

I'm very happy with my new computer. But if you're in the market, I recommend you do your homework first - there's no telling what kind of sales person you're going to get at the store.

How Does that Affect Me?

2009-12-03T12:18:00.000-08:00

Humans divide themselves into all kinds of different groups. Almost all of us group ourselves by family units. We live with our family, generally not with other families or in group settings. Sometimes we divide ourselves by our gender. Sometimes it's our profession and we will associate with people who work in the same field that we do. Sometimes it's by nationality, race or religion. Sometimes we group ourselves by hobbies or activities that we like to do. People who like to shoot guns generally hang out with other people who like to shoot guns. You get the idea...

Often times we can be protective of our groups too. If someone says something hurtful or mean-spirited about our group, we get defensive. We don't like it when someone else is tearing down our groups. We don't like it when someone else views us as bad, or substandard in someway. It's not unusual to hear about a group boycotting a movie because somehow their group was portrayed poorly in the movie. I'm quite sure the police officers and lawyers are tired of everyone viewing them as bad-guys because of some the members of their groups act poorly. Because of this defense mechanism, many times when we see someone in one of our groups acting in a way that might not reflect well for our group, we get concerned. Our first thought is usually, how does that affect me? If that group member continues with that behavior, will there be repercussions that affect me?

For example, if you've been reading this blog, you know I'm a member of the group of motorcyclists. Now motorcyclists, or bikers, are often portrayed poorly in the media. Sometimes the reputation is well earned. But I'm still often very aware of how bikers can actly badly and how that affects me. Recently I was riding home and the traffic was horrible. I was going between lanes trying to just move through without going too fast and upseting John Q Public in their cars. Another biker came up behind me and I let him pass as he wanted to go faster than I did. This guy was a piece of work. He was yelling at the cars, shaking his fist at them, acting like he was going to kick in their doors, I think he even spit on one car. He was one seriously angry dude. If someone didn't move over and let him pass, he acted like a federal offense had been committed. As I watch his tirades, I wondered - how does that affect me? Now I have to drive along behind him. What if the motorists are ticked off and they decide to take it out on me? What if they get fed up with bikers like him and they decided to change the laws so they are less friendly to bikers? etc. etc...

Never once was my concern for that individual or even the people that he was acting so poorly towards. All I could think about was myself and how his behavior might affect me. That makes me sad. It's hard to believe that I am so self-centered. Now I don't know what I could have done to help that individual. The middle of the freeway during rush hour is generally not a good time for an intervention. But I wish I had offered up a prayer or at least thought about something other than myself.

"How does that affect me?" is not something I want to ponder about too much. Apparently I spend way too much time thinking about me and not near enough time thinking about the people around me. What, or who, are you thinking about?

Creativity and School

2009-11-15T07:32:00.000-08:00

This is an incredible talk about the educational system. It's 19 minutes long, but worth every minute.

Thanks to nikao for posting this....

Risky Business

2009-10-20T21:25:00.000-07:00

Recently son #2 very thoughtfully bought me a package of Jelly Bellies. He was getting himself a bag and he remembered dear ol' dad and got me one too. That's my boy.

So for the past few days I've been snacking on Jelly Bellies while I work on the computer in the evening. The problem is, eating Jelly Bellies is risky business. The bag I have has 30 different flavors. My unscientific guess is about a quarter of those flavors are just plain old nasty. You never know what flavor your going get. You could get a couple of great ones and then one that tastes like the cross between the bottom of a coffee cup and an ashtray. Not that I've ever tried eating either one of those, but I imagine that's what it might taste like. When I mentioned it to son #2 as we were in the car headed somewhere, he laughed and said "Oh, that's the cappuccino. I didn't like it either." That's my boy.

Eating Jelly Bellies is not the only activity that is risky. In fact all of life is risky. People often comment that my riding motorcycles is risky. And there is an element of risk to riding. But anyone could trip, fall and die at almost anytime. Life is fragile and valuable. You can't just stay at home and avoid all risks. That's no way to live. The Christian life is no different. Often we long for safety, security and assurance. And while I understand that, being a follower of Christ should have an element of risk to it. You should be out there doing things, and some of those things will be risky in nature. People might laugh at you, or belittle you for your beliefs, or cuss you out, or who knows what. But how much did Jesus risk for you?

Reminds me of the old quote.

"A ship in harbor is safe -- but that is not what ships are built for."

John A. Shedd, Salt from My Attic, 1928

Are you hanging out in the harbor when you should be out sailing? What are you built for? Are you willing to take the risk to find out? That's worth pondering about.

It's the Thought That Counts

2009-10-05T06:12:00.000-07:00

You've heard the saying, "It's the thought that counts." In fact I used it in a recent post here. But after thinking about that for bit, I'm not so sure that adage is true.

Generally actions speak much louder than words. So when someone gives you a late birthday card or present and kind of sheepishly shrugs and says "it's the thought that counts," you probably are not thinking deep in your heart that "yea, it's ok that you forgot all about me." At least, that's not usually what I am thinking. Maybe you're a better person than I am. Their actions say more about how they value you than their words do.

Now I think there are cases when you can use this and have it be effective. If you really tried to put together a nice birthday present, but it just didn't work out for some reason. I think you can say, "I really tried. I'm sorry it didn't work out. But hey, it's the thought that counts." I think it works in this situation, because you really did put some effort into it. And actions speak louder than words.

But usually if you put no effort out and try to pull the "it's the thought that counts", I think you're wimping out. I think most of the time our friends and spouses see through this weak excuse. If you don't believe me, I have a challenge for you. Guys, at your wife's next birthday or your wedding anniversary (which ever occurs next), I want you to do absolutely nothing. No gifts. No card. No special night out. No anything. Then that evening just before you fall asleep that night in your bed, roll over by your wife and say "I didn't forget your birthday/anniversary, I thought about you today several times. And you know, it's the thought that counts." If you survive that encounter, please comment here. I'm sure we'd all like to learn vicariously from your experience.

It's not the thought that counts. It's taking the time and spending the effort to do something that counts. Are you spending the appropriate amount of time and effort on the things that truly important? That's worth pondering about.

How Bad Can it Be?

2009-09-30T07:04:00.000-07:00

We have DirecTV here at our sprawling estate [/sarcasm]. Well, I do have DirecTV, is the "sprawling estate" that is not so much. Anyway, we've been pretty happy with our service. Light-years better than the cable company we used to have. It's cheaper too. That's enough of the commercial for DirecTV.

Anyway, as a gesture of appreciation, DirecTV gave us free ShowTime for 3 months for being a loyal customer. We don't have any movie channels as part of our package. Netflix, an occasional pay-per-view movie and a few trips a year to the video store handles our movie needs quite nicely. So I was anxious to have ShowTime for a bit and see if we liked it.

Oh my, ShowTime is really bad. Not just a normal type of bad, it's colossally, horribly bad. The movies they show are horrible and they show them over and over and over and over.... In the two plus months we've had ShowTime I think I've watched one movie; and I had already seen that movie. The rest of them simply aren't worth watching. How does this channel turn a profit and stay in business?

I'm not upset for DirecTV giving us this disaster of a movie channel as an appreciation gift. Although here's a bit of advice to any DirecTV big-wigs who may be reading this, maybe you should consider letting the customer pick which channel their free 3 month appreciation gift will provide. I'm just saying... Even though I detest ShowTime, someone out there must be paying for and watching this channel. Although that thought baffles me. So I can understand why DirecTV would think that I might like it.

I guess the old adage, "it's the thought that counts" comes into play here. It's nice to remembered, even if the gift isn't my favorite.

Why Do You Ask, If You Aren't Going to Listen?

2009-09-28T07:07:00.000-07:00

We all ask questions we don't really want an answer to. When you walk up to someone and say "Hey! What are you doing?" We usually don't really expect an answer; we can obviously see what they are doing. It's more of a greeting than a question. Another one is "How's it going?" If someone stopped and started giving you detailed information on how it was going in their life at the moment, we'd probably interrupt them and tell them that we weren't really that interested. Again, it's more of greeting than anything.

Someone once asked me for some advice about something. I listened to what they had to say and gave my honest advice. "That's a really bad idea." Hey, I'm a straight forward kind of guy. That same person later asked two other people for advice on that same topic in my presence. And they both said, "That's a really bad idea." Ok, they used different words, but basically the answer was the same - don't do that. Yet this person went ahead and did it anyway. Guess what, it truly was a bad idea. There were repercussions regarding that action. Something that could have easily been avoid if they had simply listened to sound advice from three people.

Why do we ask, if we aren't going to listen? Many times it's because we aren't really looking for advice - we are asking for permission. But even when we don't get the permission, we often do it anyway. What makes us so hard headed sometimes?

Please do me a favor. If you get some advice, especially if it's from multiple people, listen to it. You asked those people for a reason, presumably because you trust them. So trust them. And if I ever ask you for advice - make sure I listen.

Tap To Go

2009-08-31T05:39:00.000-07:00

LA Metro has a new system to pay for your ride. It's called Tap to Go. You get this card that's kind of like credit card, you load it up for the month and then when you get on the bus you just tap it on some type of reader and then you go. Seems simple enough.

However, I think a better name would be Try to Tap and No Go. Ok, not the catchest title ever. But what a disaster it's been in rolling this program out. It was supposed to start in January. So every month when we made the trek to buy the boy's ticket for the month, they would tell us we need to get Tap to Go. We reply "Sure, let's do it." And then they would say "Well, it's not quite available yet. But you really need to get one." Huh? Eventually a lady ordered the two cards for us (because you can't order them online yourself). Twenty some days later, they arrived in the mail. Twenty days just mail us two cards. I tried to go online to prepay them so the boys could use them. What a horrible website they have. I created an account, but for the life of me I couldn't figure out how to add the cards to my account so I could put money on them. This would seem like an important part of the process. Eventually, I gave up and sent a message to support. They are supposed to answer in 24 to 48 hours. It's been a week and I still haven't heard from them. So I decided to get brave and call the help line. Surprisingly the wait time wasn't too bad and I got a friendly guy who told me they created accounts for the cards when they sent them to us. Really? That would have been useful information to include with the cards! He emailed me the info so I could log into each card and fill it up. Apparently, I'm not allowed to put both of them on one account. So this thing that is supposed to be so easy, apparently isn't.

This is the government bureaucracy that wants to run my health care. I can't imagine that ever being better that what I have now. I know our health care system needs help. But I think we could do better by fixing what we have instead the major change that has currently been proposed. The government has a hard time figuring out how to get people to pay a few bucks for a bus pass - I can't wait for the problems I'm going to have trying to get them pay for a surgery or a hospital visit. Just the thought of it gives me nightmares.

Oh well, at least my boys can ride the bus. I guess that's something.

They Know How to Get You

2009-08-28T04:05:00.000-07:00

We've just had the 'pleasure' of getting son #1's senior pictures done. Overall it wasn't too bad of an experience. He went for his sitting (which we had to pay for separately). A month or so later, the proofs showed up at the house. It seemed like there was about 500 different pictures. Wow! Most of them were pretty good and few were not. But the number of them was overwhelming.

As we tried to figure out what pictures we wanted, the number of permutations was astounding. The problem we had was there was no way to get the number of pictures we wanted in any of the standard packages. We basically just wanted one pic of most of them. We could scan the photos and make our own copies, but that's against the studio's policy. But it was nearly impossible to get the right package with the right mix of photos and the price of the packages just kept going up and up. We eventually had risen to a point of getting one of the premiere packages. Premiere includes a premium price too.

The package we had to go with to get what we wanted, was more than we really wanted to pay. We also had to buy more pictures than we really needed. I'm frustrated with the studio for their policy of them owning the photos of my son. We hired them to take the pictures. They photographed my son, it's his likeness. Why doesn't he own the images instead of them? I felt like they were manipulating the love of my son for money. It frustrates me that it worked.

I don't like being manipulated, for love or for money. I wonder if that must be a bit how God feels when someone manipulates the image or reputation of his son, Jesus, for personal gain. There's a lot of low-lifes out there that will do anything for money. Of course, you know that already. But some how we think when it comes to church and religion, we could never get taken in by someone like that - yet it still happens. Be careful. Make sure the church or charity that your supporting with your money, is using the money the way they say they will. Don't let them manipulate you.

Have you done your homework in this area? Are the organizations you support doing what you think they are doing? That's worth pondering about...

It's So Easy

2009-08-22T15:25:00.000-07:00

I think this kid has the potential to be a great driver. He can already parallel park with no problem.

Kids' Rock

2009-08-14T06:47:00.000-07:00

Funny parody on those commercials that take pop songs and make them into kids songs.

Video Link

[HT Terrace Crawford]

Expectations

2009-08-11T21:56:00.000-07:00

Expectations. We all have them. We expect certain things from the government. We expect police officers to act in a responsible manner. We expect companies to deliver a reliable product for our money. We expect our friends to be loyal to us. We expect the good guys to be good and the bad guys to be bad.

I recently went to get a hair cut. I had an expectation that the person cutting my hair would cut my hair in the way I requested. I expected that when she showed me how much she was going to cut off, that would be accurate. My expectations were not met in this case. She took off twice as much as I asked her too. Maybe we should require hair stylists to go to classes in measuring, that way they will know how much 1/2 an inch is. But I digress...

Most of us have had a time when our expectations were not met. Some of those experiences are rather benign, some are rather painful. Sometimes we set ourselves up for dashed expectations because we have unrealistic goals. For example, we might expect our fav sports team to never lose (that's what we cheer for, but can't expect that). Or we may have unrealistic expectations for our child's accomplishments.

I've recently talked to several different people who have felt their expectations of God were not met. But as I talked to them, it seemed to me that they expected God do what they wanted or what they thought was right. I understand this feeling. There's been plenty of times when I knew exactly what I wanted God to do. But does that mean God should do that? Is he bound to my wishes? What if I get a whole bunch of good Christians to pray for that wish? Should I have expectations that God will do it then? That's a truly tough question. Great thinkers have debated this for many years and will probably do so for many more. I do know this, God's ways are not my ways.... and that's a REALLY good thing.

Do you hold unrealistic expectations, especially ones with eternal implications? If so, what are you going to do about them? That's worth pondering about.

See ya

2009-08-03T20:38:00.000-07:00

If you read blogs, you probably know about using a Feed Reader. You can subscribe to a RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feed from your favorite blogs. Then you can read them all from your Feed Reader, without all that hassle of entering URLs from all those blogs. Very handy actually. Two free readers are www.bloglines.com and www.google.com/reader.

Recently, I had just over 100 feeds in my reader. But some of them I just wasn't reading anymore. In some cases the blog had changed during it's life. Maybe the author had changed jobs and was now talking about something else that didn't interest me. In some cases, I had changed and just didn't care what the author the blog was talking about anymore. So these blogs were just cluttering up my Feed Reader with stuff I didn't care about anymore.

The easy thing would seem to be to unsubscribe and just quit reading those blogs. But somehow it seemed a bit harder than that. It was kind of like I was turning away from a friend or something. No, that's not quite accurate. Maybe it's more like was saying "I'm better than you and your blog is not worthy of me to read anymore." Hmmm, that's not really it either. It's kind of hard to describe. But it was weird.

Eventually, I did pull the trigger and drop several unread blogs. Some how I feel better because I got rid of some dead weight from my reader. My 'guilt' is gone. My feed reader is lighter. And now I'm thinking about getting rid of a couple of more.

It's weird how we become attached to something or to a routine. There's real truth in the old saying that we are creatures of habit. Changing our habits causes stress. While in this case it was fairly minor stress, other changes in our habits might have more severe results. I think this is part of what makes addictions hard to kick (certainly there are other factors too). This can also be what makes it hard for some folks to make a change in their life and take steps to improve. Whether that is healthier habits, mending a broken relationship, or even making a stand for God.

Are you allowing a routine to stop you from doing something that you REALLY need to do? That's worth pondering about.

The Hypocrisy of it All

2009-07-08T09:00:00.000-07:00

Unless you’re in a coma, you know Michael Jackson died. I’m not a Michael Jackson fan, so I don’t have a huge empty hole in my heart right now. I am sympathetic to his family and close friends who are deeply saddened during this time of loss. Michael was someone’s son, he was somebody’s father, and he did have friends – and to those people, you truly have my deepest sympathies.

But to everyone else – what gives?

I didn’t get to watch the spectacle on TV, I actually have to work. But I wanted to see John Mayer’s part as I like his music. So I hunted the video down on the Internet and watched that. I was amazed about some of the comments people left. They were saying things like “John Mayer is so messed up. I hate him.” “His personal life is such a disaster. I can’t stand him.” “He looks funny.” Really?! These are people who like Michael Jackson – all of those statements would be true about Michael. Yet they loved Michael and hate John. If you don’t like his music, fine. It’s just not your style. But to hate him and his music because of his personal life and yet adore Michael in spite of his disastrous personal life, well that’s just hypocritical.

Then I turned on the TV all the news could talk about was the funeral. They kept showing various clips speakers and performers. And again, other than a few exceptions, I kept thinking, how hypocritical these people are. They all claimed to be great friends with Michael. But I don’t remember any of them standing up for Michael when he had relationship problems. I don’t remember any of them coming to his side when he had legal problems with molestation charges. I don’t remember any of them trying to put an end to the Wako Jacko stories. I don’t remember anyone helping Michael when he had financial issues. I don’t remember anyone helping Michael when things got so tough for him he left the country for a while. I do remember quite a few negative comments from the black community when Michael started “turning white.” I don’t recall any of these people doing anything to help, love or support Michael. Yet as soon as he’s gone and there’s an opportunity to show support at his funeral where lots of people will be watching – oh, they’re all his close friends then. Again, with a few notable exceptions, it just stuck me as completely hypocritical and fake.

I don’t really know what happened behind closed doors and if some of these folks really were close to Michael. I do know this. True friends are there when the going is tough. True friends aren’t afraid to stand by your side – even when you made a mistake or done something stupid. That doesn’t mean that you condone or approve of their actions, it just means that you love your friend and your trying to provide some support.

What kind of friend are you? That’s worth pondering about.

Happy Independence Day

2009-07-04T06:00:00.000-07:00

If you know anything about America, you know that the 4th of July is our Independence Day. Today we celebrate the many freedoms that our forefathers and generations of soldiers have won for us.

Today I'm grateful for what we have in America. I'm grateful for a God who has blessed our nation. I'm grateful for what those who have gone before have done for me. I hope that I can be half as influential as them and leave something to those who come after me.

What are you grateful for? And how is that going to inspire you to action? That's worth pondering about....

Happy 4th of July!

Happiness and Bliss

2009-07-02T18:50:00.000-07:00

Let's just say you are having a great day. It's a wonderful day. Everything is grand. You are happy. Life is good. As you go about your daily business in your car, everything is perfect. The radio is playing all the songs you like. Even the freeway is wide open in front of you.

If during your state of bliss you happen to glance in the rear view mirror and notice there is lots of traffic behind you (but nothing in front of you), YOUR DRIVING TOO SLOW! Please move over so the rest of us can go by you and get something done today.

I'm just saying....

Stereotypes and Bad Choices

2009-07-01T06:06:00.000-07:00

My two teenage boys love video games. I think it's nearly a prerequisite to being a teenager these days. I can certainly think of worse things for them to be into, so we try to exercise some self-control, but still enjoy game time. Part of enjoying the games is getting magazines that hype all the new games, review the games, rate the games, advertise the games, talk about the games, and -- well you get the idea.

One of the magazines they liked to read was Electronic Game Monthly (aka EGM). "Was" is the key word here. As magazines sometimes do, it ceased publication. Rumor has it the original founder will start the magazine up later this year. Whatever. For now it's dead and the publisher did what publishers do in this situation - they substituted a different magazine for the remainder of our subscription (just renewed).

I've been known to order a few magazines in my day. So I've experience the disappointment of a rag folding up and getting some second rate substitute. Usually the substitute is some how related to the magazine that has ceased publication. So if you were getting a motorcycle magazine, the substitute will be motorsports related. If you were getting a computer mag, the substitute will be a computer mag or at least electronics of some sort. So when EGM folded, it seemed reasonable to expect that another video game mag would be provided. What we got was Maxim.

If you don't know what Maxim is, well it's about this far |--| from Playboy. The magazine is clearly geared for people older than my two teenage boys. I'm pretty sure we don't need a magazine with naked ladies showing up every month. Oh, and the ladies ARE naked in the magazine, they are just posed so that you can't see certain little pieces. To make a long story short, my lovely wife quickly applied for the refund.

Gamers are often stereotyped to be late-teens or early twenties and oversexed. The publisher, following the stereotype provided a magazine that was clearly inappropriate in our situation. A better approach would have been a way for us to select between a couple of different choices. If they had done that, they still might have our business. But now they must refund money - which I'm sure they are loath to do.

Unfortunately, we often put people into little boxes when we believe the stereotypes. We think all "poor people" will act or think a certain way. Or all east coast or west coast people will behave a certain way. All rich people are stuck up. All lawyers are scumbags. All ________ (insert racial group) will be ________ (insert various derogatory statements). You get the idea.

Stereotypes are almost universally a bad idea. The real question is what stereotypes do you hang on to? How are you going to get rid of them? That's worth pondering about....

Dangerous

2009-06-21T20:47:00.001-07:00

Clarence FL1946

This is a machine that my Grandfather was using in 1946 to clear land in Florida. Can you imagine anyone using something like that today? Exposed blade, no safety gear, etc. That thing is just scary looking.

I'm generally not a big fan of safetycrats who take away our freedoms and activities in the name of being safe, but in this case - maybe it's a good thing.

Revoked

2009-06-17T07:00:00.000-07:00

If you buy a sporty car. Lower it. Put some nice rims on it. Tint the windows. Install a sweet exhaust system. And then putt around in it, they should revoke your license.

I'm just saying.....

You Need One

2009-06-08T05:02:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting quote. It's related to my last post.

“Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.”
—Jane Howard

Do you have one? Are you caring for and feeding it properly?

That's worth pondering about.

How do they do it?

2009-06-05T06:13:00.000-07:00

I suspect whatever environment you are raised in is 'normal' to you. Sure, there's extreme limits, but generally what you experienced as a child growing up is your definition of normal. I grew up in Christian family with parents that didn't get a divorce and so that seems normal to me. Your mileage may vary.

I understand that not everyone believes in God. But while I can comprehend the concept, I can't fully understand it, because I haven't experienced it. But the part that is really hard for me to understand is the lack of community that non-believers are missing. That's very difficult for me to understand.

A while back a friend was telling me of family he had met. I guess they were a pretty close-knit family with a lot of love in the family and they belonged to good church that was like extended family. It didn't take my friend long to see how special what they had was. He was also quick to realize that was something that he desired to have in his own life.

I know that people who don't belong to a church community aren't friendless. They have a circle of friends too. But it's difficult for me to comprehend life without a great bunch of people that you see nearly every week to help you along the journey. To have have community that supports you mentally, physically and spiritually is truly wonderful thing. It seems like such a disadvantage to not have that. How do they do it?

If your part of church that doesn't have a good community of support, I would seriously urge you to consider changing churches. It REALLY makes all the difference.

A Tap on the Shoulder

2009-05-11T07:10:00.000-07:00

Tuesday I rode my bike to work like every other day. It was beautiful riding weather. In fact, it was hard to go to work, the local mountains roads were calling my name. After a long day at work I went to the parking structure looking forward to my ride home. I geared up and got on the bike and it won't start. It cranks just fine, but it won't fire. Stupid bike. I checked all the usual stuff, hoses, sensors, kill switch, etc. Nothing. I even tried to bump start it. Nothing would make it start. I called the tow service we have (which shall remain nameless, but it starts with All and ends with State) and they said they'd have someone out there in an hour and half. What great service. Not! That was too late to do any good, the shops would be closed by then. So I called my lovely wife to come get me and left the bike at work overnight.

Now before we go any farther in the story, you should know that I hate it when a vehicle leaves me stranded. It's a bit like your spouse cheating on you. I don't trust the vehicle any more, I just want it out of my sight. If someone had offered me $20 for it, I probably would have sold it on the spot. So it was all I could do to keep my cool and my Christianity.

On Wednesday I took the truck to work. I was sure the bike would fire right up and I would be even more frustrated at it. But no, it still wouldn't start. That's kinda good, at least it's consistent. I got the tow truck out (after a 2 and 1/2 hour wait when he was supposed to be there within the hour) and loaded up the bike. When the bike got the shop, the mechanic got up on the flatbed truck and the bike started the first crank. Arrrrgh.... stupid bike. So he thinks there's a short or something and he works on it for over an hour and can't find anything wrong with the bike. But it needed tires and oil change, so I told him to go ahead with that and I'll pick the bike up on the Thursday.

On Thursday, the mechanic calls me and says you won't believe what I found. I'm thinking, "Great, he found the problem why it won't start." But that wasn't it. The whole rear end that holds the rear tire in place is called the swing arm. That swing arm basically mounts to the frame of the bike with one bolt, so it can articulate up and down as the suspension moves. What the mechanic found is that the bolt was there, but the nut to hold it in place was missing! If that bolt had fallen out while I was riding the bike, the rear end and rear tire would have completely fallen off. As you can imagine, at freeway speeds in LA, that would not have a happy ending.

I am certain that the reason the bike didn't start at work, but did start at the shop, is because there is nothing wrong the bike. The bike is just fine. However, once in a while we get a tap on the shoulder and God reminds us that he is still around and involved in our lives. I'm grateful that he takes the time to care for us.

So what God stories do you have? That's worth pondering about.....

Skillz

2009-05-05T19:33:00.001-07:00

There's good and there's the guys that have real skillz.

Then there is Danny MacAskill - he's in a class by himself. He's defiantly got skillz.

Direct link

How to be Rich

2009-05-04T07:39:00.000-07:00

Warning: Sappiness ahead...

Yesterday our church hosted a Cinco de Mayo party (ok, so it was really a Tres de Mayo party). I was expecting a fun time of hanging with some friends and eating some good Mexican food. That's good stuff. It turns out the whole thing was ruse to give me a surprise birthday party (2 weeks early). Needless to say I was surprised. But now looking back I understand why things seemed so weird... Anyway, it was great party. Lots of fun. It was the weirdest Cinco de Mayo party I've ever been to, but still lots of fun.

Events like this always give me cause to do a little reflection. What makes the party so fun? Is it the surprise? No, although it certainly was surprising. Is it the good food? No, but there was lots of good food. Is it the generous gift? No, but that's very nice and thoughtful of everyone. Was it the Mexican dances? No, but we got some good pics for someone else surprise birthday party. LOL. What makes the party so much fun is all the people. All the friends that there laughing and talking, that's the joy of the party. And great friends are what makes us rich.

It's easy to look at our bank accounts during a recession and to not feel very wealthy. But richness of life, joy and happiness do NOT come from a full bank account. We can all name off dozens of rich people that don't appear to be happy. We all know folks that are not rich and seem to be very happy. Certainly there are happy, rich folk and unhappy, poor folks too. What I'm getting at is richness and happiness are two different attributes that do not come in a pair. If you want to be rich, have some good friends. They will add richness to your life in unmeasurable ways. Apparently, I'm not the only one who thinks this is true. Consider these quotes:

Where there are friends, there is wealth.
~ Titus Maccius Plautus

Count your age with friends but not with years.

"Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work:
If one falls down, his friend can help him up. But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up!"
~ The Bible: Ecclesiastes 4:9-10.

If you want to be rich, have some good friends. And we all know the old saying, "If you want good friends, you need to be a good friend." Try it. Turn enemies into friends. Develop new friends. It's great! You'll never be sorry that you have great friends!!

I truly am rich.

How Big is a 100 Million?

2009-04-29T20:39:00.000-07:00

I mostly stay away from political issues on the blog. So I don't want this to become a discussion on whether or not President Obama is doing the right thing. But I think we need to understand exactly how much $100 Million from our budget really is.

Link here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWt8hTayupE

Isn't it amazing at how small $100 million can look?

So What?

2009-04-20T20:27:00.000-07:00

We live in the Information Age. There's an unmeasurable amount of information available to us. Some of us even have 24/7 access to all the information on the internet because our cellphones are internet capable. But it's not just the internet. There's more information, more news, more data, more science, more medicine, more theories, more everything. And all that data is growing. I recently read that the average 13 year old has already been exposed to more information than their grandparents were in their entire lives.

All that information is great, or at least has the potential for greatness. But what does one do with all that info? Learn to ask the question "So what?" Just because a piece of information exists, doesn't mean it's useful to you. I could know the weather report for New Zealand tomorrow - but that's not overly useful for me. I'm sure some people care about that - New Zealanders for one - but it doesn't really affect me. A careful application of the "So what?" can help filter through information that's non-essential.

This can even be true when dealing with a timeless truth. I believe the Bible is the Word of God. But not every text or passage in the Bible is useful in every situation. There are some passages in the Bible that when you read them, you need to ask "So what?" Why is this story here? Is it just a history lesson OR is there some truth to be learned in this story? You've got to run it through the "So what?" filter. And just because someone else finds a story particularly meaningful to them at that moment in their journey, doesn't mean that you will. And here's the important part - THAT'S OK. (Some of us need to read that last sentence a few more times and REALLY digest and understand that.) Maybe that text will matter in a different point in your journey, maybe it will never be a biggie for you. That's ok. Just use the "So what?" filter.

Useful information is not just head knowledge - it changes how you act. If you truly believe that 2+2=5, you will behave in a different manner than if you believe 2+2=4 (namely, much of your addition will be wrong). But information that passes the "So what?" filter, affects us. It changes us. Hopefully, it makes us better in some small way. When you find a Bible text that passes the "So what?" filter, it will change your beliefs and your behavior. And that's a good thing.

Use that "So what?" filter effectively. It will take some practice, but eventually you will be able to cut through all the noise and data, and have some great wisdom that really matters.

Miscommunication

2009-04-14T20:40:00.000-07:00

There's a billboard by the freeway on the way to work that has kind of freaked me out. It's been up for what seems like a long time, maybe two months or so. It's also in place that makes it kind of hard to see. It's on the curve on the freeway and it's kind of behind another sign. So when you are doing LA freeway speeds, the sign is not visible very long. Also, it's dark when I am going to work, and this particular sign is not lit, so I can only read the big print on it, not the smaller print. Basically the sign is hard to see.

On this sign, there's a picture of cop trying to be tough guy. He's got the dark glasses, the hat and the tough guy scowl. The text says "Observe and Report." The sign seemed very Big Brotherish. Or maybe even a bit Orwellian. I didn't know if it was telling me to watch for terrorist bombers or people who change lanes without signaling. It was just creepy. (Maybe it's just the fact that 5:30am is too early to be looking at that particular sign.)

About week or so ago, the movie trailers for a new movie hit the TV screen. The movie is called "Observe and Report." I started laughing when I saw the trailer. Not because the movie looked that funny. It didn't. What made me laugh was the goofy sign that had been freaking me out.

I drove by the sign and looked again. It still doesn't look like all the other movie signs. There's no start date or any of that other stuff. Maybe that's look they were going for.

It was a case of unclear communication - at least for me. I know that sometimes the advertising campaign tries to build an air of mystery by revealing only a small bit of the story. But this doesn't seem to be one of those types of ads. It just doesn't communicate the fact that they are advertising a movie. Seems like a waste, because their ad has not made me want to see the movie.

Is your communication as clear as you can make it? It's a never ending struggle to be clear and concise. Are you doing the hard work so you can get your message across clearly? That's worth pondering about....

PS - I just finished a great book about communication. It's called "Less Clutter. Less Noise." by Kem Meyer. It's really for church communications, but it would apply to any one who works in communication. If you lead a group or team, whether that's at work or a group of volunteers - this book is worth the read.

When Your Help Isn't Perceived as Help

2009-04-08T21:09:00.000-07:00

This is my bird Kaylee.

They say you are supposed to give them toys to play with so they don't get bored. They like toys they can rip apart. This seemed like a good one to me. No sharp edges. Should easily come apart.

Apparently, Kaylee doesn't agree with me. She is more than a little freaked out by the toy. I didn't know she was part chicken.

Have you ever tried to do something nice for someone, or help someone out, but they didn't see your offer the same way you did? It's frustrating. Sometimes even when we mean well, it's not taken that way. Are you efforts to help really help? Or are you just frightening the locals? That's worth pondering about...

Debt Free

2009-04-01T05:49:00.001-07:00

The world needs more mayors, and people, like this one.

Link here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fY79KbCptTo

No Luck

2009-03-24T21:32:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I wanted the repairman to show up early - he came late.
Today I wanted the repairman to come late - he showed up much earlier.
I'm just not having good luck with that.
Well, there's always tomorrow when he'll be out for the 4th visit. (He was here on Friday too.)
Grrrrr....

People Are Stupid.

2009-03-23T06:00:00.000-07:00

People are so stupid.

Maybe that's a bit harsh - just a bit. We might not be stupid, but we really do some stupid things. I'm not talking about the occasional goof up or mistake. We all do that once in a while - no biggie. What I'm talking about are the major screw ups. The big mistakes. The I-can't-believe-you-did-that things. Here's some examples...
- throwing away many years of marriage for a few moments of pleasure with someone else.
- thinking the rules of the work place don't apply to you. So you don't have to do continuing education, keep your credentials/license current or even listen to your boss.
- ignoring overwhelming advice from all of your friends on a given subject and doing the stupid thing anyway.
- taking questionable short-cuts to reach a goal when we know the only way to achieve that goal is to do it the 'right' way. (is any one else thinking of the crazy weight loss or get rich schemes?)

Why are we so hard-heading sometimes? Why do we always think the bad things will never happen to us? Why do we think we can get away with breaking the rules and we won't get caught?

What stupid behavior do you need to eliminate? That's worth pondering about...

Jumping Jack Fail

2009-03-18T05:54:00.000-07:00

This is just too funny. I guess some people have no coordination at all.

Watch the guy in the middle. I'm still laughing.

Softball Distractions

2009-03-16T05:54:00.000-07:00

I was driving by a high school the other day and there were some young ladies out on the ball field practicing for softball. It looked like maybe they were doing batting practice, as the pitching machine was set up. As I sat at the light waiting for it to change, I noticed that the young ladies at bat were quite a bit more focused than the young ladies in the outfield. This closely matches my own experience with softball.

See there's only two kinds of batters in softball, those who can't get the ball out of the infield and those who can hit home runs. No one ever (or very rarely) hits the ball into the field. So if you are in the outfield you've got plenty of time look for 4 leaf clovers, count the number stitches in your glove and many other numerous mind-numbing activities. So while the young ladies at bat were concentrating very hard on hitting the ball (with limited success). The young ladies in the field were concentrating on something else. Namely, cheerleading. They kept doing some little dance step in-unison that ended with leg kick. That would probably be a better detraction than the old "batter, batter, batter... sswwiiiiinng" chant that we used to do in softball. Can you image all the fielders on the team breaking into a little cheerleader dance step right as the ball was pitched? That could mess up the batter's concentration. Not to mention make the game a whole lot more interesting for the fans. After all, you can only spend so long looking for 4 leaf clovers.

I suspect that there are a couple of young ladies out there that are good at softball and cheerleading. But I'm guessing they are the exception rather than the rule. Most that are doing both are probably not the best at softball or cheerleading. I'm reminded of the old saying - "No one can serve two masters." If you want to be good at softball, spend your time on the ball field batting and fielding. If you want to be good at cheerleading, spend your time working on your cheers and dance steps. It's not rocket science to figure that out. But how many times do we actually try to do too much? How many times are we spread too thin? How many of us have our kids in karate, ballet, music, soccer, etc.? Is it too much? Do you need to cut back and spend more quality time on fewer things? Most of us probably do.

So what are you going to give up? That's worth pondering about....

Simple Pleasures

2009-03-09T06:00:00.000-07:00

My family recently got together with some long time friends for a fun evening. We didn't do anything spectacular. In fact, that's probably what made it so fun. We went out for some good Mexican food and then went back to their house. We had no particular plan in mind.

We ended up watching the Daytona Supercross race (dirt bike race). My friend is bigger fan than we are. But with his assistance of who to watch and who were the fast guys - we were able to enjoy the race. It actually was a pretty good race. Lots of drama, accidents and front runners trying to get back into the race. Very fun.

Then we ended up watching some of America's Funniest Home Videos. I haven't watched that show too much in recent years, or maybe that's recent decades. But for whatever reason, the program that night really struck a cord with us. A couple of the clips were closely related to various experiences in our own lives. We would pause the program to tell our stories (I love the DVR!). We were laughing so hard tears were streaming down our cheeks.

When was the last time you took a break and really just had a good time with something simple? When was the last time you stopped to smell the roses? You don't have to to spend a lot of money. You don't have do anything spectacular - just stop and enjoy a moment or two with some good friends.

That's worth pondering about...

Snow Day

2009-03-01T07:57:00.000-08:00

Yea, we don't get too many snow days in So Cal. But last week I went with my wife's elementary school to the local mountains to play in the snow and go tubing. We had a great time and some fabulous weather.

As you can imagine the kids had great fun tubing down the hill. There was a flat spot at the bottom of the hill to slow down and then a fence at the end. There was snow piled up at the fence so errant tubers wouldn't plow into the fence too hard. Of course some kids thought it was fun to go flying down in to the snow bank and bounce around. Ah, the joys of being young and indestructible.

On the fence every couple of feet was a sign that made me chuckle.
I'm sure that sign is there for insurance reasons. But really, do we need to be told not to run head first into a fence? Did someone plow into the fence, pre-signs, and sue. I can hear the lawsuit, "I didn't know I wasn't supposed to run head first into a fence. No one told me that." Doh!

It seems like we've raised a generation of people with absolutely no common sense at all. I guess that bothers me. It seems like we should be doing a better job than that. If you've got kids, do what you can to make sure they develop some amount of common sense. It will benefit the entire world.

Am I the only one???

2009-02-26T22:15:00.000-08:00

Am I the only one who thinks the new U2 song is awful? Yet it seems like many people are saying how great it is. I don't get it.

It kind of reminds me of the old story about the Emperor's clothes. He's as naked as he can be and no one says anything because he's the Emperor. U2's new song is as horrid as it can be, but no one says anything because they are U2.

Well, I won't be silent. It's horrid. There I said it. Bono, are you listening? Who's with me? Or am I the only one?

As requested, here's a link to the song on YouTube. I just couldn't bring myself to embed it.

There Probably Is a Law

2009-02-20T04:20:00.000-08:00

The office building where I work is fairly typical in construction. There are some nice parts (the lobby that everyone sees) and some less than nice parts (that only employees see). In our case there are some unfinished areas, like the basement, the parking structure and the stairwells. In these areas you can see lots of pipes, mostly for the sprinklers for the fire suppression system. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad we have a sprinkler system in the office. The floor I work on is higher than the tallest ladder the local fire department has, so sprinklers are good. But man, are there are lot of pipes for that system. They are everywhere.

The weird part is, apparently there is a law that these pipes must always look good. They get repainted fairly regularly. Nothing else get's repainted. Not the walls. Not the metal stairs or railings. The paint on them has worn through in some places, but they never get repainted. Only the bright red pipes that no ever touches get's repainted. Weird. There's probably some law... Who know what's it is trying to accomplish, but it seems rather pointless. I suspect it's a conspiracy by the makers of red paint. :-)

There Ought to Be Law

2009-02-18T04:10:00.000-08:00

On the way home from work, I pass 4 gas stations. Three of those stations are potential refueling stations for me. The fourth, well let's just say it has to be a cold day in hot place before I stop there. (read more here)

The three stations that I would potentially stop at are usually fairly close in cost of the gas. A few cents per gallon doesn't matter too much on any one fill up. But over the long haul, I'd like save a few bucks and get the best deal. Here's where my problem arises. No one of those stations is always the cheapest. In fact, I've not been able to determine any method for determining which station will have the cheapest gas (other than driving past all 3 and then back to the cheapest one - which would use more gas and defeat my whole goal of saving a few bucks).

It sure would be nice if I always knew that one particular station was always going to be the cheapest. I guess it's not the worst problem in the world, but it is annoying.

It would be great if everything in the world worked so my life would be easier, better, nicer, happier, etc. But, as you can imagine, the world doesn't work that way. In fact the Bible pretty clearly states that it's not all about me, it's all about God. Maybe someday I'll really learn (i.e. understand) that lesson.

What little thing annoys you? Does it just annoy you, or are you learning and growing from it? That's worth pondering about...

NASCAR and Rain

2009-02-16T07:16:00.000-08:00

I'm not a huge NASCAR fan. Parts of it are mildly entertaining, but really how hard is it to turn left repeatedly?

This weekend was one of NASCAR's premiere events - the Dayton 500. I had it on in the background while I was working on the computer. I must say, who in NASCAR approved the singer for the National Anthem. It was maybe the worst I've ever heard. Big thumbs down for that. There were a couple of cool wrecks (that is why we all watch, right?). But at the end of race they had to stop because it was raining. Really? Rain? Put some rain tire on those cars and keep going. Formula 1 runs in the rain and they have open cockpits. Even the motorcycles run in the rain.

I don't think it's a real sport until you can play/race when conditions aren't just perfect. I'm just saying...

A Change of Perspective

2009-02-02T04:00:00.000-08:00

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you know that I ride a motorcycle. (here, here and here). Riding a motorcycle is not just a hobby or something I do on weekends. I ride to work nearly every day of the year. I also leave for work pretty early in the morning and I don't want the entire neighborhood to get up when I do, so I ease out as quietly as I can.

Sometime last winter something happened on my morning ride that I had almost forgotten about - until last week. I had gotten out of my neighborhood and was on the main road out of the housing development on my way to work. I was still taking it very easy and going slowly and quietly. A few blocks down there was an older man taking out his trash in the morning. He was a bit of a mess. He was wearing pajama bottoms, a white t-shirt tank and had messed up white hair. He looked up at me as I went by and then, for no reason I could determine, flipped me off. I was mildly peeved. I hadn't done anything to him. I was trying to be a good neighbor and quietly head to work in the morning - what I done to deserve such treatment from him?

For a while I wondered about him each morning when I passed his house. Did he hate motorcyclists? Was just a crazy old man? Did he hate everyone? Eventually, he just faded away out of memory - until last week.

Last week there was a major fire in his house. The house is a complete loss. I don't know what happened. Was it an accident or intentional? Was it a wiring problem? Did he fall asleep with a lit cigarette? I don't know. I don't even know if he was hurt or killed in the fire. I don't know if he had a wife or anyone else living in the house. Basically I don't know anything about him or his situation.

But the weird thing is that I noticed that my feelings about him changed. I went from wondering if he was a crazy old man to be concerned and hoping he's OK. I guess that's fairly normal. We often come to the aid of people when disaster strikes. We send aid to places where there's been floods, typhoons and earthquakes. We help our neighbors in times of need. And that's good. But what about when the need isn't quite so obvious or related to a disaster? Do we offer help when someone is a little down? Or when they are having a bit of a rough time? Or do we only notice there's an issue when things reach epic levels?

That's worth pondering about.

Bush twins’ letter to Obama girls

2009-01-24T07:02:00.000-08:00

Days before moving out of the White House, former President Bush’s two daughters wrote an open letter to Sasha and Malia Obama, giving the girls some advice on living in the White House.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Well done!

The link is here : http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/28809961#28809961

Yuck!

2009-01-23T21:11:00.000-08:00

Today I had the privilege of doing one of the worst household chores - cleaning the carpets.

Actually I don't mind cleaning the carpets - too much. We have a small carpet cleaner that's kind of like an up-right vacuum. It works fairly well and it isn't too much effort. The bad part is dumping that nasty, black water out of the machine. Yuck! I always swear not to walk barefoot on the carpet again after that. It's disgusting. I swear the vacuum must be broken.

The carpet doesn't look that dirty. But the water tells a different story. Kind of like our lives sometimes. We don't look that bad. Everything seems ok. But a closer examination reveals the truth - we have some pretty big stains with a lot of dirt. Sometimes we try to hide the stains, this is kind of like putting a throw rug over the stains. You can't seem them as much anymore, but they are still there. There's only one way I know of to get rid of the stains - a deep cleaning. It takes effort and it is dirty, but it gives the best results.

Have you got a big stain in your life? Do you need a deep cleaning? Ask for forgiveness. Forgive yourself. Forgive the other person. Ask God for forgiveness. It's not always easy. But it sure feels good to be rid of big nasty stain!

The Main Thing

2009-01-21T04:15:00.000-08:00

The Main Thing is to keep the Main Thing the Main Thing.
-Stephen R. Covey

When you first read this quote, it seems stupid. But when you think on it for a bit, it's really true. What's the main thing in your life? What are you doing to keep it the main thing? That's worth pondering about...

RPMs Matter

2009-01-19T04:56:00.000-08:00

I supposed there are lots of situations where RPMs (Revolutions Per Minute) matter.
If you are in motorsports - RPMs matter. More RPMs means faster engines which means faster vehicles.
If you are working with industrial machinery - RPMs matter. More RPMs means more product in the same amount of time which equals more money.
If you are a cook - RPMs matter. Different recipes require different speeds in the mixer or blender.
If you are using a computer - RPMs matter. Faster spinning disks means faster access to the data on the disk.
And I'm sure there's many more. But I found a new place where RPMs matter and it kind of surprised me - my razor.

I've been using Panasonic Wet/Dry razors for a long time. I tried some other brands a couple of times, I thought they were trying to eat my face, so I took them back and went back to the Panasonic Wet/Dry. Last time I bought a razor, I thought I'd save a few bucks by buying one at the big discount electronics store. And I did save a few bucks, but that razor never worked all that well. Fortunately, the rechargeable battery didn't last all that long so I had a good excuse to get another one. This time I spent a few more dollars and got a good one. One of their big selling points was a 10,000 RPM shaver head. I wondered if that would really make a difference. Does it really matter if the shaver head moves at 10,000 RPMs or 5,000 RPMs? The answer is - "Oh yes it does!" This is the best shaver I've ever had. It's great. The shave is better in every way I know how to measure it. It's awesome.

I suspect every human endeavor has something that matters. Different careers or occupations all have things that matter. For an accountant, maybe it's the software they use. For a mechanic, maybe it's the tools. For a artist, maybe it's the paint brushes. Just about everything we do, has something that matters. Something that is important. Something that is the main thing.

As Christians, what matters? What is the main thing? What matters the most? If God asked you to only do one thing that mattered today - what would it be? Would it be to tell someone about some point of doctrine or teaching? Would it be to worship in a certain worship style? Would it be to read the Bible in a specific version? I hope it's none of those things. But what would it be for you?

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13:13 (NIV)

Are you willing to show a little love to the folks around you? Even to those folks who might be unloveable? I guarantee it will be hard at times. I guarantee it will cost you your valuable time. I guarantee it will frustrate you and sadden you at times. Is it worth the cost to you? That's worth pondering about...

Do we NEED God?

2009-01-04T06:49:00.000-08:00

I stumbled across a great article today. It's "As an atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God" by Matthew Perry. In this short article Matthew outlines why faith and Christianity is important. He says things like

Now a confirmed atheist, I've become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa: sharply distinct from the work of secular NGOs, government projects and international aid efforts. These alone will not do. Education and training alone will not do. In Africa Christianity changes people's hearts. It brings a spiritual transformation. The rebirth is real. The change is good.

Good stuff!

A confirmed atheist can see how much people need God. As Christians, can we see it and are we will to make the sacrifices necessary to help people find God? That's worth pondering about...

Read the whole article here.

[hat tip: The Philippian Jailer]

A Little Green

2008-12-30T20:26:00.000-08:00

One of the goals that I'd like to meet next year is to be a little more green. Not the color, but eco. Being green is one of the cool things that we'd all like to be, but there's so much noise, confusion, and misinformation that's hard to know what to do. For one, I think the the extremists on both sides don't help. Some tell us that we shouldn't do anything that hurts the planet - don't cut down a single tree, never run an internal combustion engine and heaven forbid never use a regular light bulb (apparently using regular incandescent bulbs is the single worst thing you can do). The other side is no better. They tell us there is plenty of oil, plenty of trees and that the status quo is good. I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

Nearly everyone believes we need to take care of the planet. It's the how that we differ on. If you believe some folks, the simple act of using a CFL (Compact Florescent Light) will save the planet. I think it's a little tougher than that, although I do have some CFLs in my house. Of course, others tell you that everything is just fine and there's nothing to worry about. I'm not sure that I believe that either. I'm no expert, but I suspect we are going to need to make some adjustments in our lifestyles. I want to do my part, without turning into some eco-terrorist.

I was proud of my little contribution recently. Like nearly everyone else in America, I've got a garden hose in the back with a spray nozzle on it. After several seasons the nozzle broke. However, I could not get that *#&$^% nozzle off the hose. The metal nozzle had fused itself to the metal end of the hose. Pipe wrenches, thread releaser, nothing worked. I needed to water the plants so I cut off the end of hose. I figured I'd just have to replace the hose. When I went to the local home improvement store to replace it, I was shocked to find out how much a stupid garden hose is. Then I saw a little plastic end to replace the end of the hose. For a $1.99, I figured I give it a try. I didn't really expect it work, I expected it to leak like crazy or come shooting off when I turned on the water. But I was trying to be a little green, so I thought I'd give it a whirl.

I'm happy to report that it works like a champ! It doesn't leak. It was easy. (And remember, I Hate Plumbing!). And it was only $1.99. Now my garden hose is like 2 inches shorter than it was - no big deal. It's as good as new, so my old one is not in a landfill. The plastic end shouldn't fuse to the new nozzle like the old metal one did. And did I mention that I saved quite a bit of green (cash)? Not too bad.

What little steps are you willing to take to help take care of the planet? That's worth pondering about...

New Year's Resolutions

2008-12-29T07:45:00.000-08:00

I'm not much of a New Year's Resolutions kind of person. It seems like I can never keep a New Year's resolution very long. I don't know what happens, but they just don't work. If it works for you - that's great. But it doesn't work for me. So my normal New Year's Resolution is "not to resolve."

But this year I do have some goals I want to accomplish. (Maybe if I don't call them resolutions they'll work better.) One of my overarching goals is to be a better Christ-follower. This one always gives me problems because it's to vague and I worry about being a fake Christian. I end up with read the Bible more, spend more time in prayer and be less self centered on my list. I guess those are ok, but they are pretty nebulous and hard to follow through on. But if you make a more detailed list, you can run into problems too. I don't want my resolutions, oops - I mean goals, to look like this.
1. Get a holier email like IForgiveYou70x7@yahoo.com. (It's available - I checked...)
2. To look more righteous and pious by carrying my Bible with me everywhere I go. (hey, maybe then I could get through the Read the Bible in a Year plan in something under 4 years.)
3. Obliterate all the other Vacation Bible Schools in town.
4. Join the prayer team at church so I can look more spiritual.
5. Follow more theological blogs in my RSS feeds.
6. Include the Bible verse of the day on my blog.
7. Make sure my church website takes all comers in the Church Websites Smackdown.
(list inspired by The Stuff Christians Like and he's WAY funnier than me. You can find him at http://stufffchristianslike.blogspot.com/2008/12/462-making-christian-flavored.html)

Recently I've been dwelling on what's the difference between the a typical, fake Christian that no one likes and a true Christ follower. My goal is to be the later and NOT the former. Everyone hates people who ACT holier than thou. Non-Christians don't like them because they are always all over their case about something. Christians don't like them because they give Christianity a bad name and they're basically a pain-in-the-neck. And I'm pretty sure that Jesus doesn't like their behavior either. I REALLY don't want to be that type of Christian.
I want to be a genuine Christ-follower, not a religious guy.
I want to be authentic, not a fake Christian.
I want to be about people, not about programs, ministries and services.
Even saying some of those things can make you throw up a little in your mouth. They are so over used and cliche that it's disgusting. But I do desire to be better. So I'm working on list that will help me accomplish those goals. It's not easy....

What are your resolutions, I mean goals, for the New Year? That's worth pondering about....

One Last Christmas Post

2008-12-27T16:17:00.000-08:00

Yea, I know - Christmas is over. But there's something that has been bothering me about Christmas this year and I thought if I wrote about it - maybe I'd get over it.

I was born and raised in the East and Mid-West. Christmas was a fun time of snow, sledding, lights, Christmas decorations and very typical winter activities. I have fond memories of going to the "old downtown" where the stores were festively decorated and walking around in the cold winter evenings. Christmas in Southern California is a completely different beast. Usually we have sunny skies and pretty fair temperatures (this year was a bit unusually cold and wet). It's a very different feeling to Christmas.

Recently, one of my childhood friends on facebook asked me, "How do you get into the Christmas spirit in California without the snow and cold?" I understood what he meant. When I first moved to So Cal, it did take some getting used to. Christmas just didn't quite seem right. However, you adjust and eventually decorating the palm trees in the front yard while wearing shorts and a t-shirt seems like a normal Christmas.

But his question bothered me (hence this post). Why should it take certain atmospheric conditions to get me in the Christmas Spirit? And what does snow or no snow have to do with Christmas? Again, I understand his question. Certain rhythms or traditions in our lives is a good thing. There's nothing wrong with that. Cold weather, snow and Christmas lights are a great combination that help us feel festive and somehow ready for Christmas. That's perfectly ok. But does it help us get ready for Christ? Or does it help us get ready for spending too much money on too many people? That's a question we each have to answer individually.

I know this year my family made a conscious effort to be less about the stuff and more about the real reason of Christmas. I like that. It feels good. We didn't spend too much money, but we had a great time with our friends and family. Perfect.

I think this verse from The Message says it best.

"Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly." Matthew 11:28-30 (The Message)

It doesn't matter if it's cold and snowy or not. It matters where your focus is. Are you focused on external things like presents, decorations, parties, etc? Not that there's anything wrong with those things, but those things shouldn't be our main focus. Maybe we should be more focused on what Jesus did, and continues to do, for us. Maybe we should be more focused on the "unforced rhythms of grace."

I know where my focus is. Where is your's? That's worth pondering about...

PS - I know I won't be missing the January/February blues when it's cold and nasty. I'll be riding my motorcycle! I LOVE So Cal!

I Celebrate the Day

2008-12-25T10:08:00.000-08:00

By Relient K

Merry Christmas!

It's Not Christmas without Some Ho Ho Hoey

2008-12-24T19:52:00.000-08:00

Gary Hoey makes some rockin Christmas music. But again, not many videos. Here are a couple of samples.

The 12 Days of Christmas

2008-12-23T12:14:00.000-08:00

Relient K style

Angels We Have Heard on High

2008-12-23T08:09:00.000-08:00

Relient K does some cool Christmas stuff. But they don't make many videos...

Music Box Blues

2008-12-22T18:01:00.000-08:00

One last TSO.

You just can't go wrong with Trans-Siberian Orchestra!

O Holy Night

2008-12-22T14:52:00.000-08:00

More TSO. From their 1998 TV special/movie.

Faith Noel

2008-12-22T12:49:00.000-08:00

More TSO

We Definately Need Some TSO

2008-12-22T08:38:00.000-08:00

That would be some Trans Siberian Orchestra!

Christmas Canon Rock

Happy Christmas

2008-12-21T16:35:00.000-08:00

Yea, it's not Christmas without John Lennon

I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus

2008-12-21T10:29:00.000-08:00

This is not really one of my fav Christmas songs. But I've always kind of like John Cougar Mellencamp.... I think that's his daughter singing at the end. Apparently she didn't get his voice.

Christmas Song

2008-12-21T08:24:00.000-08:00

Here's a rare one from Blues Traveler

One of my favorites.

God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen/We Three Kings

2008-12-20T15:11:00.000-08:00

BNL and Sarah McLachlan

Love this version!

What are you listening to???

2008-12-20T12:05:00.000-08:00

What are some of your fav Christmas tunes? Post them in the comments.

Little Drummer Boy

2008-12-20T10:04:00.000-08:00

What Christmas is complete with Bowie and Bing?

The Christmas Song

2008-12-19T21:53:00.001-08:00

This is always a classic

Dave Matthews and Tim Reyonlds

I've Been Away Too Long

2008-12-19T21:07:00.000-08:00

Sorry that I've been far to absent around here. It's just been plain old crazy, busy this year. I'm finally getting a bit into the Christmas spirit this year. I know, kind of late, but hey - it is what it is.

Anyway, I thought it would be fun to post some fun Christmas music from YouTube. So over the next couple of days watch for some of what I am listening to this Christmas.

Ken Block Shows Off Some Mad Skills

2008-11-25T15:34:00.000-08:00

This guy can really drive!

I wanna know where I can get a 530hp Subaru!

Worth Watching

2008-11-09T07:46:00.001-08:00

Wow.... What an inspiration.

What are you complaining about that you really shouldn't be?

Update: Video is now available here http://www.maniacworld.com/are-you-going-to-finish-strong.html

Interesting Conversation

2008-11-02T15:52:00.000-08:00

When the prospective jurors (that includes me) were at lunch on Friday, a situation developed that I found interesting - as well as thought provoking.

I was sitting by myself at a little outdoor eating area reading my book. The 5 people at the table next to me were heavily involved in a discussion about Prop. 8 (gay marriage). They appeared to be extremely against gay marriage - based on their language. Lots of strong adjectives, lots of colorful language that people don't use in mixed company (although there males and females at the table). As the discussion went around and around as to why gays should not marry, a lesbian couple walked past. I guess I don't really know that they were lesbian, but since one of the girls (yes, they were very young - probably high schoolers) had her hand down the pants of the other one with her hand on her butt, I'm making the assumption that they were lesbian.

As you can imagine, that couple walking past re-ignited the conversation at the table next to me. Another way of putting it, would be that it poured gasoline on the fire.

As a Christian, I believe that homosexuality is wrong.
As an American, I believe in live and let live.
Up till now those two items have never been in conflict. I realize that I can't force my beliefs on anyone else, nor do I wish too. But at the same time I don't want someone else to force me to accept their beliefs.

It's a tough issue. I suspect that either way the vote turns out - the issue will end up back in court. It kind of makes voting on this particular measure feel very empty.

That doesn't make me happy.

Rough Day So Far...

2008-10-31T11:19:00.000-07:00

I got called in for Jury Duty on my Friday off.... Bummer.
I got rear-ended by someone on the way to court this morning.... Double Bummer.
I haven't gotten put onto a jury yet.... Well, that's one good thing.

Update: I managed to escape without getting on a jury. Now to get some estimates on getting my truck fixed. At least the damage is not too bad.

Funny Marketing

2008-10-26T17:40:00.000-07:00

My son turned 16 a few days ago. He got the usual barrage of cards from family and friends. Most had some money in them to help him celebrate his big day. One card was different. It was from the Car-Freshner Corporation (yes, they spell their name wrong). You know the guys who make those little pine tree car freshener thingies. They actually sent him a Car-Freshner for his 16th birthday!
That is just classically funny.

Smart Bears

2008-10-25T14:26:00.001-07:00

Here's some fairly intellegent bears...

More funny videos like the "Super Smart Bears" at Heavy.com

Vote

2008-10-14T21:22:00.000-07:00

I seriously hope everyone is registered to vote and planning to vote this year. It's important. I honestly believe that.

If you haven't decided on who to vote for, maybe this will help you decide.

click here

Fun Friday Video

2008-10-03T05:47:00.000-07:00

I'm not quite that bad.... yet...

Back Up Plan

2008-10-02T04:57:00.000-07:00

Do you have a back up plan? You might need one.

Late is Not Always Better Than Never

2008-09-29T19:24:00.000-07:00

It was an interesting weekend here in Downey. We weren't supposed to drink the water. Now over all, this isn't all that unusual, cities occasionally issue warnings like this for contaminations. Most Californians don't drink the water anyway - we'd much rather pay premium prices for water in a plastic bottle. But I digress...

Here's some of the back story. The city of Downey "produces" most of their own water. I laugh every time I read that, but I'm pretty sure there's not a water factory in Downey. The good Lord provided water and Downey pumps it out of the ground at 25 different wells. Downey also has 25 test sites where they continuously test the water. (Anyone wanna bet the 25 test sites are next to the 25 wells?)

Sometime on Thursday, three of the 25 test sites reported higher than allowed levels of bacteria. This happens occasionally here in So Cal (and probably in other major cities too). Usually the city just works with the area affected. But for some reason Downey decided to issue the 'boil your water' release to the entire city. This hit the news outlets Thursday evening and Friday morning. Most Downey residents learned of the order to boil water from the news. Apparently this upset some folks, rightly so in my opinion. So Friday evening the city used their calling system to call all the residents in Downey telling them to boil their water. This was more than 24 hours after the bacteria had been found. At our house, we got two phone calls about an hour apart.

At the time the old saying, "Better late than never" popped into my head as I thought about how late the notice was. Chances were that if I drink tap water, that I would have done so already in the last 24 hours. This was not a big issue for our family. We could easily boil water and we had some bottled water (for my wife - I drink the raw tap water). However, it was kind of unusual to see every restaurant and fast food place in Downey closed all weekend. I bet that hurt some one's pockets.

Late Sunday evening, and by late I mean 10:30 pm, the mayor's recorded voice was on the phone again. This time telling us it was safe to drink the water. Cool. I wondered about a call so late in the evening. Linda and I had just gone to bed so it didn't interrupt us to much, but I'm sure some others go to bed much earlier than that. I remember wondering about two phone calls on Friday evening as I drifted off to sleep. Sure enough, at 11:35 pm the phone rings again with the same message from the mayor. 11:35 at night. I don't want a drink of water at 11:35 pm. I want peace and quiet so I can sleep. Needless to say, my vote will go the other guy running for mayor at the next election.

So, while I'm frustrated with Downey's leadership in handling this relatively minor situation - I also find myself wondering if 'better late than never' is really true. If the water had been seriously contaminated, instead of slightly elevated levels of bacteria (probably harmless), would telling the population more than 24 hours later be ok? I don't think so. In 24 hours I bet a lot people drink water, brush their teeth and do other things that could expose them to the bad water. Is waking everyone up, twice, at night ok? Hey, we know it's late, but we wanted to let you know... Come on. That's just ridiculous.

Most of us have probably said better late than never at least one in our lives. I know I have. I'm going to make an effort to be more careful when saying that from now on. I don't think late is better than never. On time is better. If it's your birthday, I want to tell you happy birthday on time - not late. If you are sorrowful for something, I want to tell you when you mourn that you have my sympathies, not late. If you are celebrating a wedding, graduation or other big event, I want to tell you congratulations on time, not late. On time, now that is better.