So I made it here. I finished up Jr. High group last night and (as I posted in the Prayer You section) they made Lenten commitments so be praying for them. But as for me I still am in the process of figuring it all out. But tomorrow, I am planning a day alone on the slopes in God's Country. It should be a good time for reflection and personal contemplation. I need to spend some serious time in meditation and solitude asking for God to right my heart and provide clarity and possibly some peace.
Waking at 5 this morn was not to be misunderstood as a brisk waking, but rather a enlongated process of personal battle, having retired at nearly 2:30 after a long night of packing and cleaning the (pit of despair) room in preparation of my absence. Trying to sleep on planes and on airport benches is not the easiest thing as many of you probably know from personal experience. But nonetheless it proved worthwhile to make up for the depravity of sleep of the night before.
The moment I stepped off the plane in Spokane I already felt a release of stress and overburdenedness which had be plaguing me for the last few weeks and months. 50-60 hour work weeks were taking their toll and driving me into a chasm of sorrow and doubt. I once again gleamed the light of a new day filled with the prospect of opportunity and hope that had eluded me in the dreariness of routine and labor.
Within hours of my arrival I was surrounded by hospitable company and warmth. The ability to have an open schedule to my disposal was something long forgotten, the breadth of being able to do things at the drop of a hat: refreshing; Jacob's kind and gentle friendship: once more my companion; I am excited to see how the weekend is going to manifest itself.
Plans began to form from days on the slopes to a viewing of "The Passion" to time with the old youth group. How glorious freedom after slavery is. I am gaining depth into the passages of scripture where Paul talks about being freed from the bounds of sin into a free life in Christ.
So please continue to pray for me this weekend as I spend some well needed time away from distractions and work. More specifically about job opportunities in Ministry, the situation at WaMu, God's will for this season of my life and also the friendships that will be supporting me this weekend.

So I was reading through 2 Timothy today (my scripture for the week, two days late) and I was struck by these verses.

For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time has come for my departure. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day - and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing. 2 Timothy 4:6-8

As for what I'm doing for Lent, I still have yet to decide. I have some time on the plane to think tomorrow so I'll spend some time on that. I might even steal Amy's idea. I thought it was amazing. She's stellar.

Sorry it's been a few days since the last post. Life happens. So I'm not even sure of what all happened since last friday when I posted. I think a lot of work happened. All fri and sat seems to have been spent at work. I think I vaguely remember a meeting sometime sat afternoon at the bank, but I had to leave early due to the fact that I needed to be across the street at Jamba. I did get off early, if you call working for almost 12 hours early. And made it home to a shower and the headed over to Panda Express for some grub. Then I headed over to hang out with Valerie and it turned out to be her birthday. In the spirit of having fun we popped in Cool Runnings. Then John came over and I decided that we needed to do something special since it was Val's birthday. So what better on a rainy night than to head down to Van Nuys for some hot, delicious Krispy Kreme doughnuts. Oh sooooo wonderful!!!! So if you didn't know, I never drink milk. I use it for cereal and for making food. And on the rare occasion for dipping hot chocolate cookies in. But NEVER to drink. I don't know I've just never really liked milk. As we were sitting around the table enjoying out Krispy Kreme, I tried to muster up all of my strength and might to try and take a drink of John's milk. But try as I might, for some reason I couldn't get my mind into the position where I would be willing to drink some milk. I'm a pretty daring guy if you know me, but for once I could not make myself do something. Weird.
The weekend was rounded off by sleeping in real late on sunday (I did want to go to church) due to the fact that my body needed to catch up on sleep since I had worked somewhere in the range of (50-70) hours last week. But I did manage to get up in time for MUD FOOTBALL. See since it was raining so hard Sat night, I thought to myself what would be better than to romp around in the mud playing some football. So we did. It turned out to be a real fun game and not as muddy as I'd have liked but we all got dirty enough to warrent a shower afterwards. And it rained while we were playing so that was a lot of fun just to be a little wet.
Sunday night went well. It was the parent informational meeting about our upcoming mission trip to Mexico. Then we had some speakers from Royal Servants come to Jive to talk about mission opportunities.
I ended up going home and gathered some sleep before getting up for work at the awful hour of 5 am.
Oh not to mention that I thought I had to be at Jamba at 5:45 but didn't really have to be there until 10 am. grrrrr...so I stopped on the way home at 6 am to grab some MccyDee's b-fast, took a short cat nap and then went back to work. Was at work til 2 then got to have a 5 hour break which I mainly spent sleeping. I headed over to my mom's house because I had told her I'd move some furniture. While I was there I grabbed some lunch and took a nap. When I woke up I had a voice message from my mom saying she'd been in a car accident. Luckily it was not too bad, and she was fine, but was going over to the hospital just to get checked out. That was a relief. I moved some furniture and then headed back over to work and was there WAY later than I was supposed to be. We are scheduled to get out at 11 but we didn't leave until almost midnight. All my fault, I spent too much time training someone while we were closing and I made us get out so late. My bad, I took the reprimand this morning from my manager and all is well now.
Today is still sit around and wait day at WaMu, so hopefully we will know something by the time I leave as to what the status of my employment is going to be. But I must give it to God and rely on his perfect plan. I do have to work again tonight at Jamba, which I am not looking forward to, but I do need the hours. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can; to quote a good book.

What prompted me to write today was this morning when I was in the shower I was reminded that the Oscars are coming up this week and I was thinking about who is who and who got left out. Then it dawned on me that one of the most anticipated films (well actually two films) didn't even get a nod nor was talked about at all as a notable movie of 2003. And that (those) movies are Matrix: Reloaded and Matrix: Revolutions. Interesting!?!?!?! Not one word has been captured by mine ears about these two movies during this Oscar season. Was it the lackluster final plotline? The horrendous acting by Mr. Reeves ("whoa!!")? The mindboggling-not-kept-straight-circular-argument philosophy? The disappointment of two sequels that could not live up to an unparalleled first movie? Maybe it's like the Tootsie Pop where the world may never know.
So as you sit down to watch the Oscars this next sunday night, just think to yourself, "there is no spoon", "there is no spoon", "there is no spoon". And you may find yourself achieving inner peace.

I am looking forward to my trip to Spokane this week. I'll be gone from Thurs to Mon, so I'm not too sure how much I'll be able to post. But for sure I'm going snowboarding at at least one of these two places, either Mt. Spokane or Schweitzer. Very stoked about that since last time I went boarding it was at Snow Summit, which honestly I was expecting a crappy day, but it turned out to be one of the best days I have had in So Cal, which says a lot, especially since I'm now a snow snob, due to the good pow (see powder) in Wa and Id. It will be good to see Jacob for sure, and then I get to see my youth group that I worked for as well as Jeni and Matt. Mainly I just hope I get a lot of time to relax and think. Prayers would be great while I'm on my mini-sabbatical.

If we were playing "phrase association" many of you would probably be reminded of this lady. But I bet when you think of kites you remember sunny days in the park with maybe family members or friends.
I bet you never thought this could happen...~da da dum!!!!!
WHEN KITES ATTACK (a sub-division of FOX networks)

oops I guess I linked the wrong address, it's fixed now.

Is not the amount of minutes that I get on my wireless plan. You know how I posted that story about how Cingular was going to buy out Att? So after work yesterday I stopped by the local Att store to just ask a few questions about the merger, how does this affect my plan, what are the benefits, etc. Lucky me nothing really is going to change. I get to keep my plan and billing and all that jazz. I've been looking into getting a new phone for about the last 8 or 9 months. I heard that Nokia was going to be putting out this new phone around a year ago. I was stoked to hear it was coming out. Except that the price was going to be around 250. Way tooo much for a phone. I had been researching this phone over the last couple of months. And I could never really find a good deal on it. It came down to about 200 but that still seemed like too much. And then one day I was online and I saw they were giving them away if you signed up for new service. Only problem: I had EXISTING service. No discount for Andrew. Lame. When I saw that I called them up and asked if there was anything they could do to lower the price, especially since it was on special and I was an existing customer. Answer: NEGATIVE GOOD BUDDY. Once again LAME. A few days ago I got a mailer in (where else) the mail and it was advertising my phone for only 99 bucks. Bargin city!!! It still seemed a bit much especially since cash is tight. But while I was expelling my onslaught of questions to the rep at the store yesterday, I posed the valued customer. And I finally got a decent response. He said he could knock 50 bucks off the price, plus the mail in rebate and I was getting a phone for -5 dollars (I think it works out where once I get my rebate in 6-8 weeks I will have come out ahead in the deal). Working off impulse instincts I bought the phone. I am now the proud owner of a Nokia 6800 and no longer have to deal with the archaic musings of the Nokia 3360 (which is closely related to this phone).

After I got done dealing with the phone situation I headed over to my mom's house to help her set up a desk that she bought. It was fun to hang out with her for a while and I popped in the Thicker Than Water DVD.

After being up since 5:30 in the morning I decided to go to a show with Amy and Justin down at the Hotel Cafe in Hollywood. I'd been wanting to go to a show there for a while so I jumped on the chance to go. It's such a small and intimate venue, and when we got there it was PACKED, shoulder to shoulder. But that created a fun atmosphere. There was even a guy doing a painting while one band played. Pretty amazing. The band we went to see was The Richard Swift band. It felt like you were taking a trip back to 1922 in some speakeasy, then at times it was kinda like Bono and Tom York were sharing the stage. A totally great night of music. I finally got home around 1am. Since Richard Swift was supposed to go on at 11, but the band before them were quite the bit of stage hogs and played longer than they were scheduled to.

As for the work front, it has been another *productive day at work. *Productive meaning I sat here and worked on the blog most of today. The good news is that hopefully sometime early next week I will find out my fate as it still rests in the hands of others.

A gleam of sunlight parted the dark ominous clouds bringing hope and encouragement today.
After waking at 5:30 to be at Jamba for the 3rd time this week, I roused myself out of bed. It seemed like the morning would never break the dearkness and shine its face. But no later had I become accustomed to the dark did I turn towards the windows of the store and was greeted by a brilliant view of the hills, highlighted by the early morning sun. My mind wandered from the empty store to wanting to praise the Lord and dwell in his word. Unfortunately I was unable to do so. How I love the quietness and clarity that the early morn brings. All sits still in anticipation of what is to come that day. What a moment to realize God has been working in our sleep to prepare for what we are to do in our day. It reminds me of waking up in Spokane and seeing a blanket of pure white covering the ground. Silent in the night these small flakes descended to greet us when we awoke. God's sleeplessness yields our discovery of his labor of love. And how thankful I am of that.

At one point during work I got pulled aside by my manager at Jamba (if you didn't know they are working with me to promote me to an assistant manager) and he told me as an incentive for me to put in more hours to complete training for the promotion he was giving me a raise. Oh rapture!!! This helps out tremendously, it shrinks the gap in pay between jobs allowing me to be more flexible in which job gets the most of my attention. And with the way things are going at WaMu, I'm inclined to ask them for less hours so I can spend more time at the Juice. As for what will actually happen, I'm still riding the fence. Then again that all could change if I get fired. That would make the decision pretty easy.

Had a great lunch with Amy, (and if you didn't know already, she's going to be one of my co-workers at Jamba) before I headed back to work at WaMu. UPDATE: Still no luck in them finding my $980, but I did get the opportunity to help on of my co-workers today. She was out of balance before she left and I got asked to go through her work and I ended up finding a small mistake that corrected the problem. That at least made me feel like I accomplished something today. Yet, the hours remain to pass, so that all could change.

Don't forget to checkout Waking Ashland, help them rise among the many unsigned bands who are looking for a break.

Not too bad of a day. Working off of 2 1/2 hours sleep turned out to be enough to make it through the Jamba work and a workout. As for getting the loan thing taken care of, it for the most part lost out to sleep. An hour and a half worth, which was definitely not enough. Then there came the bank. Walked in expecting the worse, and ended up not having to be Mr. Walmart. I got to sit at a desk and work on files. Meaningless but not excruciating. The best part of the day was when Outback Steakhouse needed change and in addition brought over a few different appertizers. So I got to munch on a Bloomin Onion, some cheese fries and some chicken wings. Mucho Bueno.

Jr High went well. Amy wasn't feeling well tonight so John took over and did an excellent job at holding down the fort. It was wear RED night and Converse night. What fun!! After, John and I headed over to the gym AGAIN. And did some work on our biceps and backs. I'm sore. We topped the night with some food from Subway. And then headed over to John's house for the final night of CELEBRITY MOLE.





(dramatic pause)




Well as it turns out Miss Angie Everhart was the MOLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So sorry Amy, not only was Mark Curry NOT the mole, he didn't even win. I won't rub it in. But throughout the night Amy did once again suspect all 3 of the remaining players as the Mole. Quite fun to watch.

That's enough for tonight, I've posted a lot today, so be sure to click on the BOLD BLACK words to check out fun links. I have to get up at 5 again to go to work. But since I do not to much at the bank I'll try and steal some time to post tomorrow.

Read This

In case you forgot Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" comes out exactly 1 week from today. I have great expectations for this movie.

So I worked the opening shift at Jamba again from 5:45 to 8. Not too long but good motivation to be up and doing things for the day. After work I headed over to the gym for a bit of a workout. I was walking up and who else did I run into, but my workout partner John "I hate to go" Bowling. He was finishing up his workout. He had just done a spinning class and was working on abs. So I joined him for that. Last night I made a commitment to run a 5K today. That's kilometers for those of you who aren't familiar with the metric system. By the way that's 3.1 miles. So I got on the treadmill and pumped it up to 7.5 on the dial (it's actually a small digital readout). It was hard, it turned into a mental game, and joyfully I made it. I was shooting for a consisent 8 min mile. And I think my final time was around 23 1/2 min. Which isn't too shabby. I stepped it up at the end and did some sprinting. I almost died near the end.

Now I have some time to kill before I get back to work. So I need to call a loan company to consolidate my stupid STUDENT LOANS. On a side note, have you seen that commercial for Lending Tree with that Stanley Johnson guy??? So HILARIOUS. "I'm in debt up to my eyeballs...somebody help me." (all with this huge smile on his face) Great TV. Sorry I couldn't find a site where you could watch it.
And I need to take a nap and read through 1 Timothy again.

I'll try and post later tonight after the finale of Celebrity Mole.

So I sit here finally working on the Blog again, since my last post was Thurs. I apologize. But I said to myself that I would definitely work on the Blog and catch people up on the last few days. Here I sit upon my burdened soul, tired and exhausted, wanting to expunge my musings and emotions. But alas I am able to relax and enjoy some exquisite food from Zankou Chicken which includes some wonderful hummus and pita bread, what a late night snack at 11:20 pm. In addition, for my viewing pleasure I am observing the almighty Simpsons.

Let's back track to last week, around Fri. So I ended up working all day and then all night as well, spending my Friday night at Jamba Juice until 11 pm. But I was able to convince some friends (Valerie, Kerri, Brian and a few others) went down to the local arcade and spent some time playing DDR (dance dance revolution) see this post for some cool videos of foolios dancing the night away. It was a nice wind down from a long day of work. I was then ready for the BIG day which I told you all that I'd tell you about on Sun.

So it was a huge FARCE. I really had Amy going that I actually had a date and had was going out for a day and night on the town. She came up to me Sunday morning begging me to tell her who the lucky lady was. I had to confess that I spent the WHOLE ENTIRE day at work. Some of the day at Washington Mutual and then the eternity at Jamba, so I finally got home around 11:30 pm to find my comforter and bed eagerly awaiting my presence. Sorry to disappoint those who had the hopes that I might have actually had a good V Day.

All said and done Sat wasn't the worst day ever, I enjoyed the work (at least at Jamba) and I didn't have to relish in the loneliness of (as my friend likes to call it) Single Awareness Day.

As for Sunday, that turned out to be a nice day spent with friends and wonderful fellowship. After church we all headed out for lunch at Baja Fresh to support our men's ministry at church, they were having a fundraiser. We headed back to church for a back and forth game of ultimate frisbee. A total blast, the wind wasn't too much of a problem and the weather blessed us with some sun and a comfortable setting for a great game. Doug came and played with us (he's Danni the new associate pastor at our church's husband) he's a great athlete and I really enjoyed his competitiveness. I think we are going to get along great in the future. Sunday night I did the Jive (high school group) thing. Danni's 2nd week went well, she gave a great talk and I hope that the students begin to respect her leadership and desire to grow and learn from her wisdom. After group Danni, Doug and Betsy went out for some food at Outback Steakhouse. On a side note I had a pretty crappy experience there, the conversation was great and I got to know Danni and Doug a bit better, but the steak I ordered came over cooked, so I sent it back, but when it came back, 20 min later, it was now undercooked and I couldn't wait the extra time to send it back again, so I just bit my tounge (not literally) and ate a undercooked steak and went home pretty unsatisfied.

So Monday was President's day, so that meant BANK HOLIDAY!!!! But despite my ability to take a whole day off, I was scheduled to work at Jamba that night, so I moved my shift around and ended up working the opening shift, which meant that I was up at 5 in the morning to go to work. Although I was up before the sun, I ended my work day at noon and had put in 6 hours at Jamba and the 4 hours of holiday pay at the bank. So good for me. I felt very productive. After I got off work, I did some shopping for a few things. I'll explain that in a few. Then I ended over at the girls' house and was hanging out with Michelle, Kelsey, Amy and their new roommate Christina, who happen to bring with her, noneother than CARPET, so now their house seems bigger and will help it not be so frigid. It was about lunchtime so Kelsey and I went out for some chinese food. We just had some great conversation and hang out time. Then I returned to my errands. So I initially went to Target to find some shampoo. Actually I went to find the Tropical Coconut shampoo and of course they didn't have the size bottle I wanted so I ended up going over to the local Rite Aid hoping they would have the size I was looking for. After getting my ice cream cone (it was butter pecan, yummy) I ventured to find the shampoo. Results = NONE. I decided to not make my trip a waste I went to pick up some laundry detergent. After paying I decided to check out a local Sav-on to see if they finally had the shampoo. BINGO!!!! They did, and as I was walking out I happened to walk past the laundry detergent isle. And to my surprise I found a better deal. Two 100 oz bottles for only 7 bucks, as compared to my one 100 oz bottle for 5.95. So what did I do?? I bought the better deal and then had to drive BACK to the Rite Aid to return the other detergent. So after WAY too much trouble I finally had all the necessary items of my errands. I finally retreated home to find some rest before heading out for the evening. I took a nice nap, how glorious.

After the nap I ventured out to Hollywood with Angela to check out Tyrone's weekly show at Room 5. It was a great night, aside from the extra loud crowd that was pretty distracting. There was a B-day party that was making quite a lot of noise, but overall it was just a very social evening. Which was a bit annoying and even talking to Tyrone, he said it was the loudest night that he could ever remember. It felt like most people weren't focused on the music. Bummer man. Totally a fun evening.

Then there was TODAY, Tues Feb 17th 2004. Well let's start when I got into work at the bank. So if you have been following you know that last week I ended up with a slight problem. I was missing $980. How? Why? Only God knows. But as a result a can't touch cash, have been relieved of most of my duties and today was the WORSE. I got demoted to WalMart Greeter. I spent my ENTIRE day at work standing near the door of our branch saying "Hi, how are you today?", "Good morning", "Thank you for coming in", "Thank you, have a great day", or "Bye, we'll see you again". How enthralling!!!! (sarcasm) I wanted to cry, leave, break something and everything in-between. And I get to do it all over again. And the worse part is that tomorrow I'm scheduled from 1:30 pm to 6:30 pm. And I'm supposed to be at Jr High group at around 5 pm. And since I'm not valuable to anyone since I can't do anything, I asked if I could come in early so I could leave early. And what response did I get? "Sorry, I can't do that, I will only have 2 tellers at close." My response was "Exactly, you will have only 2 tellers regardless if I'm here or not, since I can't do anything." So I left with a chip on my shoulder. Not always the best thing. I had a few hours to kill before going back to work at Jamba, so I stopped by the church to say hi to the peeps. And then had some lunch and a nap and then went back to the ol' 9-5 (actually 7-11) but you know what I mean. So then once I get to work I had to deal with a few problems including having to deal with a scheduling problem, so now I get to go into work at 5:45 am, which means getting up at 5 am again. And it is now 1:25 am on Wed morning. So I should get to bed so I can feel rested for a day of work and such. But I am excited for the final CELEBRITY MOLE. The MOLE will be REVEALED as ANGIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

On a final note, I have 2 more things. 1st: I'm totally pissed off that Cingular is buying out AT&T. So now I'm worried that my wireless plan is going to get all screwed up and such.
2nd: Today has been promote this great band day. They are called Waking Ashland and their music can be heard here. Please go and check them out. I really like their sound. I hope that they find the break to make it in such a hard industry. Go and listen to their songs and help them boost their way up on the rating list on the purevolume website.

I'll post some shorter stuff tomorrow. I apologize for the long post. So much has happened since last Thurs. But now you are caught up. Enjoy and be blessed.

P.S. My scripture for the week is going to be 1st Timothy, please keep me accountable and ask my how the readings have been going.

P.P.S. Don't forget to use the Prayer Me tab on the right side to post your prayer requests.

So contrary to popular belief (well actually contray to my own belief) last night was not the last night of Celebrity Mole. The show boiled down to the last possible moment before the Mole was revealed. How frustrating. I don't even know why it bothered me. It's only a TV show for crying out loud. I hate to be one who is so suckered in so that when the show is over, I verbally express my discontent in the end, being so anxious for what is to come next week. I thought I'd not drop to that level. Or at least not about a show like Celebrity Mole.

But it definitely was an enjoyable day and evening. I totally felt productive. Getting the Bolg working was a good thing. Taking care of things at the DMV went as well as could be expected. And work wasn't too horrible, except for making a mistake that could get me fired *see prayers. But then getting over to church to be with the Jr Higers absolved all the stress of work. Making it to the gym with John was a totally relaxing and needed experience (though working my butt off isn't exactly relaxing, but working out is something I do need to do more). Then there was the Mole, let me just re-cap that part of the evening. Amy was a blast to watch, as she at least one point during the show she had each of the 3 remaining players pegged as the Mole. She was plagued by the air of doubt, but I think all said and done she was sticking with her pick of Mark Curry, but I do have to publicly proclaim that Angie Everheart will emerge as the Mole next Wed at 10pm on ABC. (yea for shameless plugs, I think ABC owes me a check, I'm sure they'll say it's in the mail)

After we got done watching the Mole, John, Bill and I had a fairly good discussion about this kinda obscure passage in Exodus 4:21-25. It kinda seems like it doesn't fit. But all in all we shared some great insight as we talked through it.

Today was a bit more disconcerning, since I let the work thing get to me. The shadow of doubt was looming over me the most of the day which made things a bit harder. But focusing on God really puts things in perspective. As I've continued to read James these verses have been a comfort to me.

I just wanted to comment on V-day a bit. Since it seems this year to be more of a prominent occasion. I've got some amazing plans for this weekend. I really can't wait to enjoy the festivities. Saturday is so jammed packed with things that I've planned I can't even begin to describe all I'm going to do. And believe it or not, I've asked a special lady to join me in all the festivities. Let me tell you about her, she's so amazing and kind. Her heart for the Lord is something to be admired. Her willingness to put other's needs before her own, her compassion, her humbleness, and she likes me!!!! The whole enchilada.
You'll just have to wait until sometime sunday afternoon for me to post about it, since sat night I'll be to tired to write about it.

Time of arrival at the DMV 9:09 time of departure 10:23. All in all not to shabby especially since I didn't get my number till 9:43.

As you can see the new prayer link is working. So use it.
I've fixed the colors some so you can see where you need to type and all that stuff.

Anywhoo, things to do today: Buy plane tickets to Spokane to go and visit Jacob Feb 26 - Mar 1, go to work, listen to the new Norah Jones CD as much as possible, go to Surge, work out with John, and then celebrity mole. Pretty jammed packed since I've been up since around 6 this morning.

So you see I had to complete a few pieces of paperwork for work (Jamba) so I got home last night at around 11pm. Grabbed my computer and headed over to Denny's for some dinner and to work on these projects. Let's just say 3 hours later, about 5 cups of coffee later, and 3 single spaced pages later, I finally got home. I was able to get to bed fairly quickly but boom about 6 this morning, caffinene HIGH. So it's been a productive day. Already read through James again. I think my goal for the week is to read it at least once a day it's such a short book but so filled with practical living advice. I'll let you know some of the things that have stood out to me later this week.

Super dooper PROPS, to Kathryn for helping me. Truly God has gifted her with mucho talents.
I'll fix color issues later today or tonight, but feel free to start posing prayers.
I'm off to the DMV, AGAIN, so I'll be back...NEVER.

Oh one more thing, the Celebrity Mole finale is on tonight. Join us at Amy's house tonight at 10pm to watch as my pick (Angie) is revealed as THE MOLE!!!! *ADDENDUM: I guess this week is the 2nd to last week, so that only means more hilarity and intrigue.

Be blessed today and let God's grace and blessings be apparent to you today.

If you notice there is now a new heading on the right side called "prayer requests", the theory behind this is you can post comments / "prayer requests" and others can pray for you. So i've spent about 2 hourns now trying to make it work. Guess what??? IT DOESN'T!!!!! I emailed the guy who makes the program and we'll see if he can help. Otherwise unless one of you knows how to make it work. (I think the problem is it is trying to look for a '$blogitemnumber$', but obviously there isn't one since it is not located in the blog posting section) (Kathryn I'm looking to you for help on this one, if you read this, since you are a better computer geek than I)

I'll try to get this up and working as soon as possible.

Try and dance like this

When I saw this about STAR WARS, I seriously almost peed my pants or worse. This is almost cooler than wanting to see Episode III which doesn't come out till may 2005. Anyways I'll be sitting outside of a Best Buy on Sept 21st waiting and waiting and waiting. Laptop in hand ready to do some watching. Better ask for the day off now.

So I had gotten the night off from Jamba Juice so I could work on personal things and take the night and go down to Hollywood to see a show. But I caved. I ended up telling Jamba I would be there this afternoon to help out. So I signed up for 4-8. That gave me some time to go and run errands. I ended up not wasting 5,000,000 hours at the DMV. I only spent about 15 min there. Sad thing is though I have to go back. I wasn't prepared to surrender my plates (meaning I didn't have a freakin wrench to take the screws off!!!!!!!! grrr...) So that means I get to go back tomorrow, take a number and let my brain cells slip into oblivion as they are slowly mutilated by the incessant murmur of the DMV. Oh JOY!!

But back to Jamba drama. So I ended up staying until almost 9. Remember how I only was going to stay till 8?? Yeah, well, no. I ended up having to take care of some diciplinary items, which was not easy nor unemotional. The only good thing was that Amy had an interview with the manager and 4 other applicants. It was cool to eavesdrop and watch her do her magic. *on the down low* she did a great job!!! So that was the one encouraging part of that experience. Off to do it tomorrow.

So I finally made it down to hollywood to see Tyrone, Mike and Jay play their weekly show at Room 5. As always it was a great show. I ended up hanging with Tyrone, Mike and Jay at the bar after the show. Tyrone and I took some time and caught up with eachother. He told me he was currently working on a worship album to be released sometime this year. I was stoked to hear that. He's truly a down to earth kind of guy, really approachable and easy going. You need to check his music out. I let him borrow my Alexi Murdoch CD. He said he'd had heard of him but just hadn't had the time to check it out. It will be cool to hear what he thinks of it.
On a random note. Norah Jones' new album comes out today!!!! Been hearing tons of little snipits on KCRW for the past 2 weeks. Let me tell you it sounds so amazing. One of the 1st things I'm gonna do tomorrow afternoon. That and the DMV.

Well I really should stop staying up so late doing this stupid thing. Since I'm sure all of 3 people actually read it on a regular basis.

So yesteday was a great day. Had some great worship at church during the 11th Hour, I always love the fellowship of 1st Pres Granada Hills, kudos to Bill Sperry, Angela Michael and the rest of the worship band. The true meaning of worship has been on my mind lately, especially about what we do as corporate worship. Thinking about how this time is supposed to be a time of renewal and encouragement after a long week of being in service of the Lord. More and more I have been trying to view worship as a time for myself to fellowship with other believers and find out how they were working for the Lord during the week and how we really need this time to come together to be strenghtened. Sunday worship is not ever a obligation or a "I feel good time", I truly believe that worship should be for the tired, weak and broken, a place where we can be vulnerable and find the grace of other sinners. I love the image of the desert fathers, after being in solitude, prayer, fasting and spiritual warfare for a week in the desert, these men would gather and be encouraged and fellowship with song and prayer. I am also reminded of the new testament church as we see in Acts. How all these believers would be out during the week serving, healing, traveling, spreading the news of Christ and worshipping Christ everyday. And then the time of corporate worship would be that time of sharing, praying and empowering for those who were out in the world working. I have become dismayed that corporate worship has just become this ritual or a time that people come and listen, I think that this time should be a call and response, the pastors call us to do something or teach us something and then we are to go out and apply and do what we were taught or called to do. I would love to see this model used today, and for more people to be willing to accept and practice this model. Instead of the come, sit, leave, do nothing model. *on a side note, as part of our Jr High advisor day, we watched this video about churches around the world and this one church in Africa struck me. After the service they would leave dancing and joyful ready to do the work set before them. How many times does everyone just file out of church and walk to their cars or over to the coffee pot. I want to see people dancing in the streets rejoying that they just had the opprotunity to worship the Lord with all of their hearts and then I want to see them continue to worship all throughout the week never ceasing to reconize the glory and wonder of Christ's love.

But enough ranting and such, I had another great day on Sunday. Oh how I appreciate the weekends where I don't have to work. Even though Jamba called me to work I told them NO!!! I have limits too. I really need to be strict about saying no about work and yesterday was a good case in point. After church we played a great game of basketball in the back parking lot. Right after that John and I took a dip in the hot tub at his apt. Oh baby, oh baby. It almost got to the point where I didn't want to get up to go to High School group. But nonetheless, I went. It was Danni's first night as director and she gave an awsome testimony about how God has been moving in her life. I'm excited to see how she's going to focus this group towards loving Christ and serving others.

Well now I'm off to stand in line at the DMV for like 4,000,000 hours.

Tonight I'm headed down to see Tryrone Wells at room 5 in hollywood. You should check it out.

Bruce Lee 2 3 4 has got to be one of the coolest guys, if only I was asian...

If only I could do this.

What a great Saturday...First of all no work!!!

Second, we had an amazing Jr High meeting. Just us leader folk. We spend a good time thinking and praying about our communities and trying to figure out what strongholds need to be broken in order for God's work to be done. Prayer can be an amazing thing if we allow our selves to intercede on the behalf the Father himself. If only more Christians would be willing to take seriously their commitment to be people who are unashamed to proclaim the name of Christ, we for sure would see a different climate of culture here in America. A revolution and revival of deep spirituality and prayer that effects change is wholly possible if we take the responsibility to pray for and with each other to break the bonds of slavery that satan holds over us, not allowing us to live up to our potentials of followers of Christ. All in all if you want to hear more about what we talked about feel free to ask. But if you want to be praying for us, just know that some of he issues we were thinking were strongholds on Jr Highers and our community were: The lack of family involvement, not only in spiritual growth but also in investing in each other; the secretness of our culture, our unwillingness to completely be vulnerable with each other; the sexual onslaught of LA and the valley as well as the culture; the social standards which young boys and girls are held to and the resulting self-images that these students live with; the lack of prayer for and about what God is capable of doing in our communities and lives; and finally that God would bring about a revival in our community and our nation. Revelations 3:14-22

After our meeting we had a great lunch at Fresh Choice where we stuffed our faces and left feeling tired but ready to shop. Since we all were going over to the Lofgren's (Jamie and Karen) for Jamie's 26th B-day party that was themed the 80's, we all needed the correct garb. So where else to shop for circa 1983 clothing than The Goodwill? I personally found a cheap rip off a Members Only jacket. But it looks oh so cool. Then Amy helped me find a pair of WAY too short, shorts from the women's section and I topped off the outfit with a white with brown striped polo shirt. For my hair doo for the night I resurrected the Mohawk or Mohawk. Granted mine didn't look as cool as this one but you get the point. What a radical looking dude was I. All of the getups were fly 'G'. I got to cook tonight as well. What a blessing. Definitely don't get to do that enough. Didn't get my recipe from FoodTV.com tonight but I got to do some steaks and some roasted potatoes and then made some wicked Mac and Cheese. No, not the Kraft kind but homemade kind. But I gussied it up with some Kilbasa sausage and carmalized onions with a bread crumb topping. I think it was a hit, people said they enjoyed it. Amy couldn't keep her paws off of it even before it was time to eat. It was a good night with friends and good 80's music. I stayed a little late and Jamie and I enjoyed a little game of darts with his new dart board. What a great day. I even got a nap earlier in the afternoon. How great is that!!! Hopefully Sunday will be as relaxing and Christ focused as today was.

Be blessed in your conversations and do not be ashamed to proclaim the name of Christ to all whom you encounter.

Seriously, never ever, ever get a job at a bank. Unless it involves being able to walk away with all the money and have no consequences. I HATE WORK. I'm at work writing this...I'm getting paid to blog. Guess that makes me a professional blogger. But I had a great morning with Jamie, Bill, Mark and Steven the best 7 year old golfer (he's not that great but he was giving ME hints on my golf swing) at the driving range before they went to play a round. Which incidentally, lasted from 10:40am until around 4:30pm. I saw Bill after and all I have to say is LOBSTER is not his color. At this point in the evening I will get a 30 sec drive across Devonshire to head to Jamba Juice for another stint at work. HOW FUN!!!!! But all in all I really can't complain. I'm looking forward to tomorrow's festivities: Jr. High leader day and Jamie's 26th 80's Bday bash.

If you get bored...I'll be at Jamba till 10pm come and visit.

Oh and in case you were wondering I didn't get any work done last night. The other post for today is proof of how my time was spent. ~ smack that penguin

Fun Game

my high score was 532.9
click once to release then a 2nd time to "do your thang"

Props to my bud James Fischl for the heads up. (his best 593)

So I finally had a night off of work. No Jamba Juice so I decided to hang out with friends. Only problem...everyone seemed to be doing something already. But then came John to the rescue. We started out the night just hanging out watching Steve Harvey's Big Time with this guy who is world air guitar champion and a 700 pound sumo wrestler. Quite oddly amusing. Although it was not enough to seize the moment of a night off work. We tossed around the idea of pool but couldn't think of a quality place to play. So we decided on Sherman Oaks Castle where we could hit a few in the batting cages. So I called up the roomie (Joseph "the Dragon" Liu) and the tres amigos headed out like a baby. We picked up some sticks and clocked a few. Got a nice blister on the left palm cause I gots the Kung Fu Grip. It was fun, be it we were in the 50 mph cage. Then we headed inside for some arcade action. Some classics like Super Off Road and the infamous DDR (dance dance revolution) (check out these videos to see some wicked dancing) I'm that good, you know. If I was really asian I might be. But white boys can't jump or dance for that matter. Therefore proving I really am white. After all was said and done we made a stop at In-N-Out. I had a scrumptious Neapolitan shake and some fries. Didn't know they served Neapolitan shakes? Now you know. Check out this PARTIAL list of the secret menu. Now I'm procrastinating from doing actual work, like filling out application for youth ministry jobs. So now I am going to attempt that. I'll post tomorrow after a long day of work. But I get to go the driving range with some boys tomorrow morning and then work a 12 hour day. It'll be worth it to get no sleep again, since I only got 4 hours last night cause I was playing with this stupid thing.

especially since I work at a bank and all.

click here

So I think I have all of this stuff worked out. I've got the comments set up so leave a message as a few already have. Thanks. Also I got all of my color schemes in place so when you click on links and such they turn different colors and stay that way, I think they are all uniform at this point. I spent the better part of the morning at work just trying to get the entire background color to be the same. Finally!!!! I will be adding more links soon as well as other fun things and musing in the life of Andrew. I think I may create a small place for prayer requests to be posted on the site if I can figure out how to do that. But stay tuned, I'm losing a lot of sleep for this. Tonight may just be another late night.

PS check out my rant on Amy's blog (in the comments 2/4) to see what I have to say about the show "the MOLE"

Well I've gained some basic knowledge about how to use this thing. As you can see from my last post it's been quite some time. And honestly I've been messing with this thing since then. I'm beginning to learn this CSS language which is a version of HTML. Guess I need to learn that too. I'll just do that in all my spare time. Since I have that comming out of my ears. (splat) [that's sarcasm for you].
I think I'm going to work on some comment things then maybe call it a night.

Well actually I've been doing this for years, I finally found this thing called the internet so I decided to try and make it happen, people got tired of having to come over to my house to look at the chalk board that kept my random thoughts and then if they missed one it wasn't like I could bring it back up since I had erased it the day before.