Accounting for the last 3 1/2 weeks

5/24-26 I finished moving and prepared my new pad for the folks subletting.

5/26 The above took much longer than anticipated, so I had to take the ferry across the lake to get back to Minnesota in time. I forgot preaching clothes, so stopped at Macy’s and spent too much money. Between Macy’s and my folks’, I choked on water and nearly drove off the road. I had to spit the water out (all over myself and the dashboard) in order to avoid dying.

5/27 Got lost on my way to preach and arrived just as the first hymn started.

5/29-6/2Drove from Minneapolis to Seattle.

6/2 Went to a cage fight.

6/3 Got to see my best pals west of the Mississippi for the first time in a year. We went for a run. I almost died again, but it had nothing to do with choking or water. Mostly to do with hills. I also forgot my toothbrush, so they took me to Trader Joe’s of all places, where I bought a “new” one made from recycled yogurt containers.

6/4-5 Had two days of orientation for my summer internship.

6/5 Met Deb and her husband, their friend who has some really fat cats and a bunch of other crazy folks from Pennsylvania.

6/6-12 Went to Iowa for my denomination’s big annual governance/worship conference.

6/11 Marched my little seminarian butt down to the floor during a plenary session at the conference in order to defend the needs of torture victims. The body wasn’t even voting on whether or not we should join an alliance to support torture victims. The vote was to decide if we should take a year to study this. Throw me a frickin bone.

6/12 Flew back to Seattle and strongly considered taking a different summer internship in Arizona.

6/13 Had my first ‘real’ day on the job. The day started at 6:45a.m.

I am tired, but I have a million stories to tell and just as many phone calls and emails to catch up on. We’ll see what little stories and tirades I can pump out later.

Christian things that make me want to barf

Gag. I had to re-shelf this piece o’ insanity tonight in the library. I can seriously not believe that someone actually came up with this, thought it was a good idea, and then got some company to market it.

I am particulary fond of the way they allude to missionary life being “one giant game of laughter and strategy.” Good one. I’m sure all the people I worked with during the last two years of life would completely agree. I could tell you missions life is a game of all kinds of different things, but I don’t think laughter and strategy would be the hallmark characteristics. And frankly, I wouldn’t call it a game.

Besides just being a load of crap, I think the makers of this game got their missiology off the back of a Cracker Jack box. Here’s what can happen to you while on a mission trip in Germany:

1. You win five members of a cult to Jesus. Other members chase you to a train station. You escape. Gain 50 blessings.
2. You lose all of your luggage and tracts because of neglect. More will have to be sent to you. Lose 25 blessings. (Because until the new tracts get there, you’ll have to actually spend time talking with people. You’ll only be able to share the message with 4 people per day as opposed to 423.)
3. You make a better effort to learn German to be a better witness. Gain 25 blessings. (I guess all that time without tracks made you frustrated enough to decide that perhaps you should engage the culture.)

What I want to know is how come getting chased by hooligans gets you 50 blessings, but trying to learn the language only gets 25. That’s crap.

My personal favorite is when on a trip to Poland, you lose 25 blessings for smuggling in French Bibles instead of Polish ones. What kind of freakin’ idiot are you??? And what mission board lets someone that stupid go to another country?

Anyway, if you’re up for a giant game of laughter and strategy, Missionary Conquest is all yours for the low, low price of $29.99.

Just don’t ask me to play it with you.

My greatest fear has come to haunt me

A bird.

In the library.

While I’m working.

You have no idea how scared I am. I’m supposed to go up the 4th floor to shelf read, but I am afraid to get in the elevator because I’m afraid the bird will get in there with me and start pecking me while the doors are closed.

Five Bucks a Cup

Camp is over. My girls pulled off yet another win…barely squeaking by a bunch of 8th graders. Go team! Besides the over the backboard shot, the funniest thing that went on with my girls this week was the following conversation:

B: Hey Coach!
Me: Yeah?
B: There’s a pizza party tonight, right?
Me: Yeah. You need to be back here for that at 5:30.
B: Is there going to be a keg at the pizza party?
Me: What? A keg?
B: Yeah, a keg.
Me: Uhhhhh
K: Well there should be. You guys could charge like 5 bucks a cup.
Me: Well, I guess that would make us a lot of money, but for some reason, I just don’t think that would be very appropriate.
B: Wow. Could you imagine if everyone here was getting plowed?
K: Yeah. That’d be awesome. We might actually win a game that way.
A: No. I think that would just make it all worse.

All of the girls involved in the conversation were sophomores. I just stood there half shocked, half cracking up. But I quickly exited the conversation when they started trying to decide which one of them was the biggest lush. I just didn’t feel the need to know that.