Picture time. Who wants to read what I have to type when they could be looking at pictures instead, right?

In the spirit of truly catching up, I'm going to rewind 2+ months to when I was still in the US, and still had a cell phone with a camera in it. What follows are a few selections from the stuff I saw in the past year or so that I may or may not have remembered to document for blog purposes.

Once I run through these, I'll start going through my flickr sets (to date) and begin putting together some recaps on what I've done so far...more to follow soon.


This is from the night before I left the states (we are working in reverse chronological order here, fyi). Peter, Jonny, and I went to see Rage Against The Machine playing one of their 4 reunion shows, in the McCovey Cove parking lot in San Fran. It was pretty much one of the coolest nights of my life. We got Taco Bell, I slept for 2 hours, then we got up and Peter took me to the airport and I came to South Africa. Best weekend ever.

This was on the BART platform heading into town for the show. It reminded me of NYC (where I've taken similar pictures), but it also had that out-in-the open BART station feel. Whenever I have a bad day I try to remind myself that I sleep in a bed.







Robbie and I went up to Mossy and Grandie's place during my last week home and Mossy cooked my FAVORITE. Yums.



I took this on what I honestly hope was my last trip through security at O'Hare International, ever. I had just gotten through another retarded wait in the priority security line, which is a joke in and of itself. But this was just too classic TSA to pass up. I was kind of afraid I would get nailed by security or the cops for taking pictures of them, but I went for it anyway. What you are looking at is TSA rookies, studying. Not in a classroom, no, they are flipping non-chalantly through their training manuals, at makeshift metal desks, in the middle of the busy O'Hare terminal 3. Wow.

Now we're back to pre-leaving-NYC. Suin and I somehow got into a mostly-empty Waverly Inn, on a Friday night, no less. Still not sure how that happened, but as you can see, we battled the Australian Tiger Prawns, and won.








I wish this one had turned out. It was so typical of Hoboken. It was one of those bar sidewalk signs advertising the specials inside. What was special about this one is that it pointed out that it was the anniversary of Alcoholics Annonymous, and then listed the drink specials they were offering to celebrate that fact.




There's a lot of great architecture in NYC, but this fuse of old/new construction, at 15th and 9th, is pretty much my favorite.














The marketing major in me loved this ad campaign on the sides of NYC's buses this past summer.










The appropriately French french onion soup that Tank ordered when we went to Tartine, the Monday after Memorial Day. We hung out in the village all day and I was reminded how much I love Manhattan.











If Cregan plays his cards right, Titus will be the next Tiger Woods and he'll be set for retirement (and maybe I can get good seats at the Open?). He's pretty much the coolest kid in Hoboken, I can't wait to get back and hang with the fam.










Typical NYC straightforwardness.

So the town where I'm actually based here in South Africa is called Pretoria. Its the executive (administrative) capital of the country (Cape Town is the legislative capital, Bloemfontein is the judicial capital). Its situated in the same province as Johannesburg, about 50-some kilometers north of it. Gauteng is the smallest province in ZA, and it is also the highest populated (roughly 10 mil?), and the best. They're fairly proud of their provinces here, which is kind of cool. (and no, I still haven't bothered asking why its abbreviated Zed-A)

Pretoria is situated in the highveld - well on the edge of it and the bushveld. The highveld is a high (surprise!) plateau area in ZA about the size of Belgium, and Johannesburg is also situated on it. I think Johannesburg is at about the same height above sea level as Denver, and Pretoria's at roughly the same height.

While its got less to see and do than a Johannesburg, based simply on its smaller size, it still feels fairly large and has quite a number of varying neighborhoods to be explored. I'm staying in the nicest one I've seen, to date, which is a blessing indeed - in a complex on a hill on the far western side of Pretoria, and the neighborhood is called Waterkloof Ridge. There are a lot of Jacarandas in the neighborhood, which makes it quite pretty - Pretoria is called the Jacaranda City, in fact, named for the trees that for a few weeks every year have the most amazing purple blossoms you could imagine (pictures on my flickr, soon). They are out in full force right now, so it is cool to be here for that.

Even in the nicest neighborhoods, however, all of the apartments / condos / houses / what have you are all situated within security complexes (read: surrounded by tall walls with electric fencing on the top - often with a night security guard at the front gates, etc.). And there are bars on every window and every door in your place, and that's just life here. You get home, you lock yourself in, until the next morning, when you let yourself out for the day. Its like a self-induced jail, but you just learn to deal with it.

That said it is quite a nice complex I'm in, and when I'm diligent I get out for a run in the morning on the hilltops above the city, which is pretty freaking cool. Still doing light runs because I haven't shaken the plantar fasciitis in the foot, which is now going on 3 months old. I should probably give it a name, since its like a part of me now. I think I will call it Rip. Rip, my foot pain. I miss my physical therapists.

The one big surprise I had about Joburg was that it is NOT a tourist destination. This first really hit me when Brian and I headed to the Apartheid museum - there weren't 25 cars in the parking lot, late on a Saturday morning. When people come to South Africa they go to Cape Town, or on safari. If they see Joburg at all, its only passing through the airport on their way to points elsewhere. And it really is a vibrant city, with much to offer (in a very South African way, mind you).

Pretoria seems a little more laid-back than Joburg. I feel more secure here - a little - not much - sense of less crime / more safety, but its not to be taken for granted. It doesn't feel so oppressively big that you could accidentally make a wrong turn and end up in the wrong neighborhood, whereas there are parts of Joburg where I have done just that. Pretoria feels manageable, which is a nice transition to the country. Not to say that I don't think I could handle Joburg - many people do it just fine...its just that I like it here. That's all.

April. Early April was the last time I got two blog posts out in as many days.

The shame.

Well, that streak is over now. What's next? More lists about posts that I'm claiming I'm going to write in the future, that's what. Its later than I had hoped to start blogging tonight so I'm not actually going to try to give one of these following topics the thought and effort that they deserve this evening, rather I'm going to preview-list them.

- The church in ZA (so far). Two things in particular I want to write about are the missional slant and an orthodoxy seemingly unaffected by western shifts of late (prophecy being one of the situational examples that comes to mind).

- Being here to witness how the country as a whole reacted to the Springboks' victory in the Rugby World Cup. It truly was the opportunity of a lifetime.

- The travel lifestyle and the lack of community it fosters. How I've dealt with that in the past, how I'm dealing with it now internationally.

- Book recaps on a few other ones I've finished recently.

- At least a couple of other things that I can't think of at the moment. I really need to start carrying the mini-notepad around with me again.

I am going to make (yet another?) attempt at returning to semi-regular blogging. I think weekly is an ambitious first goal.

And I do think this is actually a good time to give it a shot, now that I'm done with my first 2 months which involved some sort of travel almost every weekend. Which was fine, and in many cases awesome. I've been on 3 safaris, saw England, Kenya, and Tanzania for the first time, saw Cape Town and areas surrounding, and have gotten very familiar with Joburg (headed down there for my first official braai, after which I'll be watching the Springboks take the rugby world championship.

Also, I have a South Africa 2007 iRB rugby ball that my friend Carolien, who knows famous rugby players, is going to get signed by Brian Habana. Contingent on them winning tonight, it will become either the coolest thing I've gotten on my trip yet, or the second coolest (the lion's tooth from Masai is pretty freakin cool).

So, here's what I have planned in the near future of the now-undead blog. Let's hope.

- Finishing up a few of the drafts I've had sitting out there for months on end, including a quasi-book-report written when I finished "A Sacred Romance," and one of those list-of-things-i-like posts, which I just barely started back in May.

- Pictures from the trips. I'm going to try to pull out some of the best ones I've gotten from the trips so far, and perhaps get some brief synopses of said trips typed out as well. And link back to the flickr sets, for those who haven't seen them yet.

- Pictures from my cell phone, before I left the states. Kind of a reflection back on some of the good things I've missed since I left.

- The introvert's manifesto. More on this soon. I've been realizing a few things since I got here.

- Thoughts on ZA so far - which will probably turn into reasons why I really like it here.

I'm looking forward to a few weeks of settling down in Pretoria, catching up on local life, organizing the general disarray, catching up on my guitar and Afrikaans.

Its 1340 in the afternoon on a Sunday and I'm sipping Cap 'n Coke in the biz lounge for South African Airlines, due for a 1540 flight back to Joburg.

Its been a long, long couple of weeks. But good. Mostly.

Last time I posted I was headed off to Cape Town with Brian for the weekend. It was a good weekend. We got in and found our place down on the shore, not far from the Cape, and had some drinks in the local bar a few doors down. There was not much food to be had, arriving at the time that we did in CT. The next morning I tried desperately to wake Brian for our trip out to Seal Island to see the Great Whites breaching, which he had so wanted to do in the first place, and I had been rather skeptical about. But he wouldn't get up, so off I went in the dark to the docks, where we met with our boat and headed off to the middle of the bay.

The breachings were incredible - massive sharks coming full out of the water in hopes of coming back in with a seal in their maw. We spent the rest of the morning tooling around looking for more sharks, then whales, then back to port. Brian got back from a whale-watching trip he had taken instead, and we drove down to the southern tip of Africa - Cape Point. We hiked it a bit, took pictures, and then drove back to the hotel, where we picked up our luggage and departed for Gansbaai.

Gansbaai is home to the best Great White cage diving on the planet (I might mention that Seal Island is home to the only regular breachings on the planet). We spent the night in a room with an ocean view, the sliding glass door open, sleeping in the frigid sea air. The next morning we hopped our boat out into the straight, and when we dropped anchor and had the cage in the water, Brian and I were the first to volunteer to hop in the cage.

Skydiving was pretty cool but I've never felt my humanity more viscerally than in that steel cage, when the 20 foot long beasts of instant death showed up to eat our tuna treats. At one point, one of them came near the cage, and I got a feel of its massive, slimy torso. I'm pretty sure it didn't notice me. So...yeah. That was incredible.

After that we headed to Franshoeck, in the heart of the ZA wine country. Spent a nice night there and then did a couple of wineries, one of which had a fantastic cellar tour complemented by THE BEST Pinot Noir I have ever tasted.

Then, off to Cape Town, where we hiked Table Mountain in the afternoon. A small hike compared to what I'm used to, especially beginning so close to sea level, but it was a respectable climb, and Brian and I made it up in fantastic time, and got some great shots of the city from above.

I made a stupid, stupid mistake of recording over some of my shark footage on the way down. When I'm smart some day, I'll invent a way to make the camera ask you if you're sure you want to record over this footage you already took. Que sera.

Went out in Cape Town that night. It was...interesting. There was billiards, then tequila and mexican food, then dancing in some club where Jenny and I were among the very few whites left (Brian had left for another area more suited to his particular social circles). The next day we had brunch down by the water and then off to the airport.

It was a good weekend. A great Friday - an epic one.

The following week the new consultant showed up. More on that at some...later... point. I tried to teach her to drive a stick after a long week of work - that was my Saturday. Sunday we joined our wonderful client lead, Gerard, for a trip to see the Johannesburg Symphony Orchestra (of which he is a member) perform. That was pleasant.

Another week of work, peppered with various "issues," and then it was off to London for the weekend, as I had training for my ADP program on Mon-Tues of this past week.

It was an overnight flight from Joburg, so I arrived Saturday morning and collected my bags, then took the train to Paddington and a cab to the hotel. Once showered, I met up with Grant and we kicked around Chelsea and Kensington a bit. Fish and Chips in a pub watching rugby - on my list of things that God made because He wanted me to be happy. I left Grant later in the afternoon, tubed it to Westminster, saw the abbey (from the outside), crossed the river, walked up the South Bank, crossed back, wandered through the theater district and then tubed back to the hotel. Met Brian and a few of his very fun Londonite friends out that night for bad Chinese and good drinks after. Last call in London is midnight. Go figure. Also, just my style.

Sunday was church, with Grant, nestled just behind the Girken (sp?). Jenny showed up, which was, well...great. Out for lunch in Borough Market after that for more F&C at a nice brewery, which was even better than the day prior. Grant took off to look at places with a realtor and Jenny and I had a nice afternoon walking around and seeing the sights - London Tower, the bridge, more South Bank, Sir Francis Drake's schooner, back across to St. Paul's, more of Hyde-be-a-utiful-Park, then met Brian and friends for drinks and dinner back in Convent Square.

Monday and Tuesday were spent in training. Tuesday night was off for Heathrow again and an overnight flight to Nairobi. Wednesday morning we (Kemi, the consultant, and I) arrived, showered, and headed in to WV's offices. Had a couple of good days of meetings, capped off with a dinner at Carnivore, the biggest place (and most famous, et. al.) for exotic meat in Kenya. The most exotic they had that evening was Ostrich meatballs and Alligator steaks.

The trip I had arranged to Masaai Mara fell through that evening, so I asked at the hotel if they could help me arrange another. They had a girl there in the morning, who quoted me a price that sounded reasonable, but I later found out was exorbitant.

Anyway, Friday morning we (a number of young traveller types and myself) drove out in a Mutatu (taxi mini-van turned "adventure vehicle") from Nairobi to Maasai Mara. About a 6 hour drive, most of which was over roads that in the US would be considered extreme off-roading. Saw a lot of south-western Kenya.

We arrived in the park Friday evening in time for a game drive, then back to the camping village (tented units with beds in them). Decent food, early bedtimes, early rising for morning game drives. Saw the same as in ZA - zebra, wildebeast, giraffe, elephant, lion, etc.. And then yesterday afternoon, we found my Cheetah, which made it all worth it. She had a little baby with her. It was cool.

After this morning's drive (less than stellar), I caught a prop plane back to Nairobi, then through more traffic and streaming sidewalks of people who occasionally noticed my open window as evidenced by shouts of "Wewe Muzunga!" and my taxi driver laughing. Picked my luggage from the hotel and then he dropped me off at the airport...which brings me to where I am right now, about halfway through a drink, with ice, for a change. Next to a bathroom, with real toilet paper. In a lounge, with other white people.

South Africa prepared me, but Kenya is really "real" Africa. I'd say of the people I saw, about 0.005% were actually not black. I saw many Maasai and got to tour a village. It was really an incredible experience that made me re-examine a lot of things. More on that soon.

Back to ZA.

So I'm in South Africa now. Sitting in the Joburg airport, headed to Cape Town.

Everything kind of happened real fast and then all of a sudden I was here. Then things kept going real fast and now all of a sudden I've been here almost 3 weeks, which have seen a lot of stuff I need to write about. So why haven't I?

I've been vainly holding out hope that I might finally get my own domain up and running, but I'm using a HORRIBLE hosting service that has made the whole process mind-bogglingly difficult, and I just haven't had the time to sort it all out.

Sort it out. That's a common phrase down here, which I like. Say I owe someone some money - "I'll get you sorted out next time I see you." Something like that. I like it. Others I'm digging are "Pleasure." They say that instead of "You're welcome," except they say it with their distinctly beautiful South African accent. I might not get the accent right, but I'm adopting that term too. One that I'm not adopting, because it was already a part of my normal vernacular, is "Howzit?" as in "How's it going?" There's no "going" involved here, just the "Howzit?" and it seems to be a very accepted form of greeting around here. I didn't use it much in the states, at least not verbally, but definitely online, and I'm using it plenty here, and it feels great for that first 5 seconds of the conversation where they say "Fine thanks, and yourself?" and then I start talking with my American accent and they realize I'm not from here. I'm also brushing up on a little Afrikaans, but I'm trying to figure out how it fits in society here - whether its really considered the language of the oppressors, or its generally acceptable, or what. Its hard to tell - I think most blacks speak it but I get the impression its out of a historical courtesy or perhaps necessity.

So there's that. One small facet of assimilating to the new culture. I'm a minority now - the country is about 80% black and 10% white, and when you leave the metropolis, that number starts to skew even further to the extreme. Most people you'd interact with speak at least some basic English, as would be expected, the level of comprehension declines in a fairly correlated fashion with the level of economic success.

Economic success. That's an interesting one here. I'd estimate about 20% of the population have something of the sort, and that number includes most of the 10% of the population that is white. It seems like a country with promise - given its recent history - if they could find a way to create the jobs that are so desperately needed here, you get the feeling that they could quite quickly pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

In the meantime, there's the driving community and the non-driving community. You pass them on the side of the street no matter where you go or when you go there. Its two very distinct cultures, where race is only the first difference, to be sure. More on that soon.

Weekend 1 was spent going down to Joburg to visit Brian and see the Apartheid museum. Weekend 2 was spent going to Madikwe Game Reserve in northern ZA (they call it "Zed-A" here, abbreviated ZA, rather than SA), where we were just south of Botswana. This weekend I'm off to explore Cape Town and the surrounding areas with Brian, and do some shark diving. So not much spare time to write, but I plan to finally have a weekend in Pretoria next weekend. Then its off to London, then Nairobi, then back here but off to Kruger National Park...

This website just isn't going to get set up. 3 weeks in and I still haven't sent out the "Hey I'm in Africa follow me on my new blog" email to everyone. We shall see. I've got Apartheid pics up on Flickr and will have the Safari ones there soon. Everything beyond that is just hopes and wishes at this point. But at least I've written something, now.

[21:20] FifthTigerofAsia: so tell me about the trip details

[21:20] davechkjr: this thurs night (hopefully) i get back to NYC from Chicago. Friday / Saturday are packing / moving into storage / going away party.

[21:21] davechkjr: Monday morning I leave for my last week in Chicago, then I fly home to Cali.

[21:21] davechkjr: Spend a week or so there, then on 8/19 i get on a plane for Johannesburg

[21:21] davechkjr: where I will be til April

[21:21] davechkjr: maybe a trip back for Christmas / New Years

[21:21] davechkjr: i just need to copy/paste that to my blog so people know what's up

A question to ponder...

Are you a prostitute or are you a consultant?

1. You work very odd hours.

2. You are paid a lot of money to keep your client happy.

3. You are paid well but your pimp gets most of the money.

4. You spend a majority of your time in a hotel room.

5. You charge by the hour but your time can be extended.

6. You are not proud of what you do.

7. Creating fantasies for your clients is rewarded.

8. It's difficult to have a family.

9. You have no job satisfaction.

10. If a client beats you up, the pimp just sends you to another client.

11. You are embarrassed to tell people what you do for a living.

12. People ask you, "What do you do?" and you can't explain it.

13. Your client pays for your hotel room plus your hourly rate.

14. Your client always wants to know how much you charge and what they get for the money.

15. Your pimp drives nice cars like Mercedes or Jaguars.

16. Your pimp encourages drinking and you become addicted to drugs to ease the pain of it all.

17. You know the pimp is charging more than you are worth but if the client is foolish enough to pay it's not your problem.

18. When you leave to go see a client, you look great, but return looking like hell (compare your appearance on Monday AM to Friday PM).

19. You are rated on your "performance" in an excruciating ordeal.

20. Even though you get paid the big bucks, it's the client who walks away smiling.

21. The client always thinks your "cut" of your billing rate is higher than it actually is, and in turn, expects miracles from you.

22. When you deduct your "take" from your billing rate, you constantly wonder if you could get a better deal with another pimp.

23. Your pimp seams to often abuse you, forgetting that without you, he would not have a business.

24. You do all the real work, but the pimp has a higher stigma and more money, and really just has to "coordinate" the work for you. Sometimes, you wonder if you could just make more money pimping out yourself.

25. You get so brainwashed into the lifestyle, that you don't realize that life can be better, until it is too late.

26. Personal time, or a work/life balance, is meaningless to your pimp, all he cares about is satisfying the clients, despite how many times he tells you he loves you.

27. After a few years, you find that all your non-prostitute friends are no longer your friends, because you lost touch and your schedule and lifestyle was difficult to manage, and you find that you associate primarily with other prostitutes.

28. The turnover rate is ridiculously high. Everyone thinks they can do it for a few years, no problem, but after just a few clients railing you, many break under the pressure, or quit for a better life.

29. Most of the time, your job could be performed by a well-trained monkey.

30. You thought college was a waste of time.

(From a work email - I couldn't keep it together at my desk, reading this. If you haven't worked in the industry, I suppose most of the humor here will be lost on you. And I wish I was you.)

Links, yo. Links.

This Google goodness is a little older, but still interesting.

I can't wait to be one of the last living humans with nobody left to say "I told you so" to. (No, seriously.)

Still a few good summer mini courses left to check out via my church. Nice job, Justin.

South Africa time: lotsa safaris to plan, not to mention the shark diving. Also, South African culture (thanks Ang). Also I've been spending time researching my vaccinations and visas. Also, not SA specific, but I'm hoping I might be able to see Zimbabwe while I'm over there. So far its a strong chance I'll see at least Kenya, Uganda, Sudan, and Zambia. Also, Africa's potentially largest game park.

Saw Geni a number of months back but now it looks a little better.

Ocean's 13 writers doing Entourage for Wall Street (this should be like 10 times as good as the LA version).

My birthday is coming. I'm just saying. Please note that was 4 links, not 1.

How not to suck at socializing. Speaking of which, there's a couple places I'd like to check out before leaving the city.

Last, 33 things you didn't know had names, and some weird coincidences.

Had dinner with Christie last night and she semi-inspired the all but dead blogging flame in me to get back into the swing of things in preparation for the upcoming project in Africa. Which is a good thing, but one more thing on the stack of a million and two things to do between now and leaving for the opposite side of the planet. But I am going to give it a shot all the same.

One thing that I've been kicking around in my head is exactly how I'm going to blog when I am in fact there. I want to keep this blog going, but I'm seriously considering a different, trip-specific blog that can be its own entity, of sorts. Then I suppose I can just figure out how to RSS all my posts there onto this one, and add personal posts here that I don't want to share on my more at-large trip blog (which I'll be making known to colleagues, etc.). So I need to figure out how to jones that.

Also, I'm going to try to do a more feature style for that blog. Some of the features will certainly be places I go and things I see, but I also want to run features on the prominent characters I meet during my travels and what's unique about their lives / world-views / etc.. I'd also like to do regular features about how the trip is changing my pre-conceived notions and perhaps even my world-views. And lastly I'd like to of course feature my insight into the statistics and demographics and whatnot that make up the dark continent and the western (mis?)conceptions that we hold of it. I'd like to write about how I think change would be best pursued there and use it in a sense to work towards planning out my next steps after returning home.

The ADP program asks its participants to return to their home country and spend the year following the ADP project back in the paid practice, so that ADP won't be charged with your attrition should you decide to leave the company. I hope to find a local project in NYC for that year and use it to figure out whether I want to return to school or find another path into more long time international development work. Dave's got me thinking about the GRE's and a masters in International Economics. He's also got me thinking about constantly growing my stack of play chips in Full Tilt. I've pushed 500K recently. Once I hit my first mil, I'm going to throw a hundred bucks in there and see what I can do with it.

Project was down last week so I got to stay home and procrastinate training and packing that I really should have gotten done. I did get to some of the packing later in the week, and tied down a storage unit. Packing up boxes really helps the reality of things start to sink in. I am going to Africa. I am going in little over a month. It is going to happen. Wow.

Also, watched fireworks on RI with Dave and Jon and AM and Ang and Amber and Ben and other various friends. Saw Tim's fiancee's show Cigarettes and Chocolate on Tuesday and caught drinks with the kids after that. Hung out with Suin for the first time in like 4 years. Started Band of Brothers again. Read a lot. Played a lot of FT. Good week.

Blogging, as it was intended from before the concept of time even existed, from my rooftop deck, beneath the illumination and noise of the GLBT parade. I will leave it to your internet search techniques to discover the origin of said acronymn, but to my memory the acronym is correct and these fireworks are rainbowically correct as well.

I like this day of the year simply because they feature (usually) the best fireworks display from our particular city view. I suppose, should I move at some point to the West Village, I should have a similarly wonderful point of view, however subjected it may be to the exuberant festivities I in no way doubt are taking place in said neighborhood at this moment.

The fireworks show was exceedingly short this year. This is surprising. There was nothing even nearing a grand finale. Interesting.

...how about some links?

I want.

I am.(Sometimes.)

I agree with...

I need a career in...

I want. (do that a lot lately, eh?)

I want to go to... (and I might mention all my so-called-friends have alreay gone without me...)

I enjoyed.

Juuuuuuust cruising in under the deadline that would have been a month sans writing anything at all.

Wooooow.

Anyway, gotta new approach. Gotta have one. Its like this: something's better than nothing. So here's a preview of the new format:

- ADP wants me for a World Vision project, based on South Africa, starting in August. Its very surreal at the moment. Have to get the current project to let me go, first, but that's like the last thing before packing up all my stuff on the week of 4th of July, and then I'm gone, til some time next year. So...yeah.

- Had another really great day just enjoying the West Village. Beautiful weather for it, went to Nicole's church and then brunched after. I really, really want to move to that nabe when (if?) I come back from South Africa (if means if I go, not if I'll come back or not. I'm coming back. At least for a while.).

- I haven't even tried to write anything of mildly theological substance lately, but I'm ok with that. I've been learning a LOT this past year or so and I feel like an athlete coming back from a season off for injury or something. Not to say I'll get back on that soon, but I at least hope to.

- Camera broke on the last trip to Young Life camp. Gotta get a new one quick. Need to throw some pix up, too.

- Youth group is winding down for the summer break again. 5 years - in a beautiful heartbeat. Wow. Speaking of which, we're headed to New Orleans this summer for another rebuilding trip. Appreciate your support...more to come on that.

- Still stuck in Chicago every week in the meantime (that pretty much covers the rest).

I love Thursday nights, when the plane finally touches down at EWR. There's work to be done on Friday, but Thursday nights, no matter the Air Traffic Control delays, I am home. I love standing outside the terminal and breathing the warm port air, I love the local car service in Hoboken that knows my voice on the phone and is always waiting to get me home.

And I love the city lights coming into view as we speed down the 1&9 towards the Holland Tunnel. That is the best part of my week.

I'm not ashamed to say I love getting into Hoboken and cruising the streets towards home, especially on those nights when we're not getting there too late. I love it for the same reason I've loved this crazy little town ever since I first moved here - you can not get home without seeing pretty girls who are also trying to get home, or to the next bar, or what have you. Its just nice living here with them.

But damn, do I hate Friday nights.

Most of them, at least lately, I've had to work late, and then I order in and fatigue takes over and all of a sudden its mid-Saturday morning. Before that, when I was slightly less crazy, I'd wrap up late in the afternoon and head into the city to plan Sunday's lesson with Cregan at the church offices. Then maybe I'd hit the movies with Dave or meet a friend out for dinner.

But every once in a while I get roped into something in Hoboken on a Friday night. Tonight it was Matt's wedding rehearsal and the ensuing dinner. Rehearsal went smooth, then we were down to the waterfront for a nice dinner, and then it happened. Snuck up on me without a forethought, it did - my first walk home through the streets of the Bo on a Friday night in months untold.

And every one of those pretty girls is out with her boy. No one is single in this town on Friday nights. Cute couples on the river walk. Drunk ones on the main strip. Trendy ones having dinner at the nice restaurants. Cancerous ones having smokes on their stoops. Walking out, walking home, going shopping, coming home from work, out for a run, hopping in the car, they are just freaking everywhere.

A million reminders of how. alone. you. really. are.

I don't doubt the existence of infinite love and grace. Its just sometimes I think God maybe is capable of hating me in some cosmically simultaneous way.

Wow. Last published on April 22nd? Seriously???

I used to write. Now I just check back in on this thing like some forgotten friend that you keep saying "man we really need to grab a beer sometime" when you run into him from time to time.

And I hate how I have to start every post like this these days, so next time I'm just not going to, regardless of how long it takes me to get to next time.

Church was interesting today - TK preaches a morning service on the west side and there was a bike race that shut down all of 5th Ave. thus preventing him from getting to the east side service in time for the sermon. So the scripture gets read, and Bisgrove gets up, adjusts the mic, and says "I got nothing." 3000 people laugh, somewhat awkwardly. He actually did a great job of ad-libbing it, got us all to sing Amazing Grace acapella (sans the actual words/music in front of us), and then decided to proceed with the communion that usually comes after the sermon on the first Sunday of the month. Communion complete, still no preacher. Bisgrove leads us in a prayers-of-the-people of sorts and then we start the final communion hymn one more time, planning to dismiss after that. TK shows up on the last line of the last verse and gives a great sermon from Esther, a book that does not make mention of God.

Last night was the membership dinner / meeting that I think is one of the best ideas the church ever had. They rent out the Metropolitan Plaza and combine our annual meeting to elect officers and such with a delightful hors d'oeuvers hour followed by a dinner, complete with an hysterical emcee (who happens to be the guy who's behind the mask in those creepy Burger King commercials). And that's followed by lots of presbyterians and wine and dancing all mixed up, if you can buy that one.

What else? Oh yeah, Robbie was in Chicago. We went to hear Michael Medved speak. The guy is good intentioned but he'll never really be ineffective because his big moral platform doesn't really have any bastions supporting it. I kind of thought that was the case so when Q&A came I gave him a pointed question to prove it. Which he did, in turn. Too bad.

We went out to Morton's and blew my whole week's per diem on one dinner, since I never get to see her, and that was just a blast. Hopefully put some meat on her tiny bones before sending her back off to Mexico. And then after dropping her off I got that ticket that I so deserved from the day before, 10 states away. I don't think I deserved this one so much though, so I'm gonna fight it. Go me.

The last few weeks have been a LOT of work, little sleep, and trying not to work much on the weekends. I got a pretty darn good performance appraisal, which was nice and I think perhaps somewhat deserving - I've worked hard with half the team I was supposed to have, and I'm still fairly close to delivering on schedule (ok, the last part is iffy). I don't like flying to Chicago every week but I'm still hoping that a role with ADP will crop up by mid summer and remedy that situation. If not, who knows?

I know I don't.

Two weeks just like that.

Slipping, I am just plain slipping.

Let's see if we can remember some of it real quick...

Today was church and youth group and then some reading on the deck in the sun (picked up a big thick Cosa Nostra history called "Five Families"). But, I woke up in Fairfax, VA this morning - early, and then set a land speed record from Jack and Rebecca and Gretta's place to mine, caught a shower, and then couldn't find parking so I missed most of the service when I finally got into the city - argh.

Had a brand new red Mustang with a big ol engine and how I'm not in jail after this morning is proof of the grace of God. Speaking of Grace, I drove down yesterday afternoon to surprise her at her birthday party, so that was good times with old faces.

Friday night I went to a Wheaton Alumni event at the Harvard Club where Dr. Jerry Root - one of the leading scholars on C.S. Lewis - spoke. I was in attendance at the behest of my grandparents who a) both went to Wheaton and b) are good friends of Root as they used to attend his church in Santa Barbara. He was a really nice guy and very eager to talk with me when he heard who I was. Headed out to Karma with the Daves and Chrissy and Jen and some of her friends, and I will never step foot in that bar again ever (hint: fumes).

Before that was another insane week at work.

Before that was last weekend, when I was...sick for the 4th time this year. Freakin travel and airplanes and whatnot. So that was a bust.

Before that was another insane week at work.

And before that was Easter, when I last wrote.

This next week should be another insane week at work. Funny how they keep happening like that. Gives me precious little time to sleep or read or work out or enjoy being alive.

But Robbie is in Chi-town for a wedding so I'll have dinner with her tomorrow, that will be fun.

Rise heart; thy Lord is risen. Sing his praise

Without delays,

Who takes thee by the hand, that thou likewise

With him mayst rise:

That, as his death calcined thee to dust,

His life may make thee gold, and much more. Just.

- George Herbert

Shameful, how far I've strayed from my former levels of regular writing. And for the life of me, I can't really explain, much less justify the situation. Granted, I'm working a lot and travelling all the freaking time, but I've written at least semi-regularly in the past with the same constraints. I'm rather at a loss...

I may be in Africa by the end of next month. Its hard to say. I'm due to end my current project by mid-May, and there are roles with ADP, one in particular with World Vision, that are starting around that time. Its going to be an interesting couple of weeks - I have to really slam on my deliverables at work to start getting them in front of the client, and in the mean time I have to actually land the project with WV, manage all the expectations of the Senior Execs that have input on my move decision, and close the deal. That's the problem with the fact that I've worked hard on this project and (I think) done a fairly good job with what I was given - they don't want me to go. But it is what it is, and I think at the end of the day they'll support me on this, hopefully.

Then I just have to pack up my life and throw it in storage (so to speak). And then I'll be gone for a while.

I am, for the first time in quite a while, really truly excited about a new life direction of sorts.

Today was Easter, in case you didn't know. I hit church in the morning, then headed over to the Lenox Hill hospital to visit one of our youth group kids who got an appendectomy this weekend. Then RI for a big meal with a big group of people at one of Dave's family's friend's place - awesome lady named Dee. Dave's family and AM were there but Jon wasn't because he was at the Yankee game. I wished I was at the Yankee game. Headed back to the 'boken and helped Cregan and Clint hide the eggs for their kids - watching kids find eggs is one of those warm experiences that you know won't be a lot different in the new heavens and new earth - because you can't really improve on something that great. Or maybe you can, which is like extra awesome on your awesomeness.

Tiger didn't win the Master's, but I did get my laundry done before Soprano's starts, in 15 minutes. But not my status template for work, gotta do that after Entourage I guess. Tonight is a good night - hard to have a bad one when you're filled to the brim with swine.

Some links, just to clear out the FF tabs...

Speaking of swine, I want to go here.

Google's doing a free 411 service now. Its Google, so there's no adds (which makes sense, if you know what their motto is).

I didn't make it to the Theory sale this weekend but its still on tomorrow if you're one of the lucky people who doesn't have to leave NY every week for work.

I haven't played Mao in a while but it came to mind recently, and I need to play it again soon.

Oh, and the picture in my profile? It was taken on the deck of this ship, which is now at the bottom of the ocean. Freaky.

Not writing here but I have been elsewhere.

Links on a Tuesday? Is nothing sacred?

I finally broke down and bought a membership to Conquer Club. Behold, the internet has broken down the barriers of distance that limited the in-fighting that used to only exist at the holidays, between the younger three Knowles brothers and I.

Children of Hurin is coming.

Adding randomness to your photos.

None too often you see an anonymously authored article run in the WaPo...

I need this.

NYC Inside.

Why the semantic web will fail.

If the world was made of rubber...

Great eclipse photo.

I'm completely against letting people know about the power outlets I'm familiar with in the airports around the lower 48.

The Amen break: world's most important 6-second drum loop.

From Vail...

This is no less than the 4th time in the past couple of weeks that I've opened up the delightful MS OneNote to blog while north of earth by 30,000-some feet. I never actually got around to pasting any of the former attempts into an actual post, as the continuing lack of posting whatsoever testifies to. These 4 recent attempts all sit shamefully just below the page of some that I wrote back when I was in Miami. A year ago. So if those never got posted, that gives you some idea…

Nothing I write anymore is anything close to the quality I was putting out when I was actually making time to read/write on a regular basis, anyway, so nobody's missing out on anything. I'm trying to make a resurgence on the reading but I've been trying to do that since college. Goodreads appears to be perhaps a decent method for keeping track of what I've been reading and perhaps letting my friends hold me somewhat sublimely accountable by their voracious amounts of read books that will consistently dwarf mine. What I don't like about it is the fact that at least 50% of my reading is online these days. I just finished Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde online recently - I guess I could throw it on Goodreads but I never cracked the actual book. Read a lot of Asimov this way too. Not that I'm reading a lot, by any means.

If you don't know about MS OneNote, allow me to enlighten you - its an awesome, little-known note-taking app rolled in with the full set of MS Office products - sans FrontPage, that is - if you happen to work for the kind of company that requires you to have such things. Or if you happened to drop the kind of cash I'd never think of giving to a company like MS, personally. Now you know. Half the battle. 10 points for the kids who can name that pop-culture reference.

This weekend will be the first "normal" one (by my standards of recent years) pretty much this whole year, save maybe one in January that I'm not recalling at the moment. If you've read my blog for any amount of time you're familiar with that format, I like turning into a creature of habit on the weekend, I find it quite comfortable:

Friday I work too much. Then late in the evening I get my take-out Chinese and retire with the latest from Netflix (still working through Season 1 of Arrested Development at the moment).

Saturday mornings I meet with the closest thing I've been able to find to an older man / mentor to talk through life stuff. On weekends when Kuz is in town and we're both free, we meet for lunch/accountability somewhere in Hell's Kitchen. I like the dining options around there, always have. The rest of Saturday is usually a mixed bag, the exception to the creature of habit bit…although it usually involves a mix of putting the finishing touches on the lesson for Sunday, watching some form of sport on the tube (bring on baseball season), and when the weather's good and I've been regular with my running - a nice long one.

Saturday nights continue the mix theme - poker, hitting the West Village haunts with Dave, dates, maybe catch a movie, whatever. Nothing too late what with Sunday mornings.

Church starts with youth leaders meeting to pray at 9:30 before the UES service. Then I head to the service with the high schoolers. After, we head to the church offices and have senior high group. That goes til 3ish depending on how good the conversation in group time pans out. There are 16 or so Sundays in the year that involve football for the next few hours. The rest involve getting home and catching up on life stuff that needs to be done before packing and crashing early because Monday morning's flight is gonna be an early one.

Kind of takes all the fun out of stalking me, doesn't it?

Anyway, that's what I'm looking forward to this weekend. I've been traveling for various reasons for a LOT of the weekends in the last 6 months, which is a LOT more difficult when you already travel for the week. I'm looking forward to NOT doing that for the next few weekends, spending a good deal more time in the city, and enjoying it while I'm still there.

After all, potential ADP projects are looming.

I still need to blog about that, don't I?

...later...

So what ended up happening? I worked too much on Friday, then headed into the church offices where I talked to Katherine about some interesting positions there, but at this point I'm not really sure that's the right move for me. Cregan and I worked on our lessons and then went to see 300 with Dave. Movies were still getting a decent turnout despite the blizzard. Flick was OK, about what I expected of it. Cool to see a movie set in a historical place I got to visit recently.

Saturday we had a youth leaders brunch in the city to discuss this year's mission's trip. Except, when I showed up to Cregan and Mindi's to catch a ride, I found them beginning the process of cleaning snow drifts out of the car after the sun roof vent had been left slightly open during the storm. So that took us about an hour. Brunch went nice, then the rest of the day was chilling and working on the lesson. Today was typical - church, youth group, home now. Picking up the roommate and his fiancee on their way back from Paris at the airport in about an hour, so I have to take off for that now...

So my sister is like totally a nurse now. Woot.

Well, about a year ago I was battling illness, busy with youth group events like the 30 Hour Famine, in love with NY and making promises to write more about it, and, on the other hand, warning about working too much to blog regularly.

Not much has changed.

Sick for the second time in 3 weeks, so that's very not cool. I wasn't sick for the Famine (2 weekends ago) for a change, but I didn't do the sleepover as work has been, well...work. The hours these days are similar to what they were a year ago - far too many, but now it just seems to come with the new title, hence - less complaining on the blog and more straight up work. Traveling to Chicago doesn't help.

From a Volkswagen ad in a ski mag I was reading in the doc's office at lunch today:

You have "a thing." And no. It's not your "issues." Or your "stuff." It's the one thing you love doing. And maybe even being. Maybe you feel it when you're plugging in a guitar. Maybe you feel it when you're sitting in the middle of the ocean, alone. Waiting. Maybe you feel it when you're taking a load of Little Leaguers to Districts, two states away. Whatever it is, its your thing. And it's always been your thing. Okay, sure. People may share the same thing. But deep, deep, deep down, you know your thing is a little different. (Okay...a lot different.)

Oh, and I got accepted into Accenture's Developing Partnerships practice, which is flippin sweet. Next post will elaborate on that.

(maybe)

(oh, and the picture...long story short, one of my good college buddies named Dave [what else?] did an internship for the German company Sick one summer, and our whole senior year we couldn't get over joking about how sick everything was, like how sick the forklifts in their warehouses were, and how sick it was to be in Germany, and how sick...you get the point. Anyway, good times. Dave's married to a cool girl now and I think they have a kid. Last time I saw them was my 5 year reunion, right at good old Benji's, where I left him.)

Thirsty hearts are those whose longings have been wakened by the touch of God within them. - A.W. Tozer

I recently finished reading The Sacred Romance (although the sidebar won't reflect that, or anything else I've read / watched / listened to in the last couple years). I have to say that this is the first book I've read in quite a while that either a) caused me to begin making some life changes from the rut I was in prior to reading it, or b) been quality enough that I plan to re-read it shortly.

One of the things I liked best about the book was the humility that was evident in the writers' style. This is a humility I see in what I consider to be the best of writers and orators: they are not afraid to rely heavily on the previous wisdom of others. They offer a unique and relevant point of view, however it is clear that their thoughts are heavily seasoned with what they have learned from those who went before them - and are quick to quote and cite these sources. C.S. Lewis is an excellent example of this, relying heavily on the ancient church fathers. I also like my pastor's style for this reason - of course it helps when the person employing this tactic is as well read as men like these.

Some examples, with related thoughts from the authors:

Power can do everything but the most important thing: it cannot control love.... In a concentration camp, the guards possess almost unlimited power. By applying force, they can make you renounce your God, curse your family, work without pay, eat human excrement, kill and then bury your closest friend or even your mother. All this is within their power. Only one thing is not: they cannot force you to love them. This fact may help explain why God sometimes seems shy to use his power. He created us to love him, but his most impressive displays of miracle - the kind we may secretly long for - do nothing to foster that love. As Douglas John Hall has put it, "God's problem is not that God is not able to do certain things. God's problem is that God loves. Love complicates the life of God as it complicates every life. - Phillip Yancey

Satan gets us to side with him by sowing the seed of doubt in our first parents' minds: "God's heart really isn't good. He's holding out on you. You've got to take things into your own hands." And Paradise was lost.

---

We come into the world with a longing to be known and a deep-seated fear that we aren't what we should be. We are set up for a crisis of identity. And then, says Frederick Buechner, the world goes to work:

Starting with the rather too pretty young woman and the charming but rather unstable young man, who together know no more about being parents than they do the far side of the moon, the world sets in to making us what the world would like us to be, and because we have to survive after all, we try to make ourselves into something that we hope the world will like better than it apparently did the selves we originally were. That is the story of all our lives, needless to say, and in the process of living out that story, the original, shimmering self gets buried so deep that most of us hardly end up living out of it at all. Instead, we live out all the other selves which we are constantly putting on and taking off like coats and hats against the world's weather. (Telling Secrets)

---

We have all read in scientific books, and indeed, in all romances, the story of the man who has forgotten his name. This man walks about the streets and can see and appreciate everything; only he cannot remember who he is. Well, every man is that man in the story. Every man has forgotten who he is.... We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are. (Orthodoxy) - G.K. Chesterton

Every woman is in some way searching for or running from her beauty and every man is looking for or avoiding his strength.

---

It is impossible to live the spiritual life in the ontological lightness of doing because our hearts and minds have become enemies rather than allies. Neither are we free to love or serve.

All in all, the book had a powerful message which resonated thoroughly with me at the time that I read it. That, however, is a caveat in and of itself - I don't believe it is a book that's been aimed at people who aren't in that point in their life that they are ready to hear its message. And I think that I just barely got to that point before I finally cracked this book, in God's good timing. For the first time in a long time, I'm not quite so skeptical on hope.

Well, its nothing deep, but its a post that has nothing to do with me (and everything to do with stuff I think is cool). Its been a long time coming, but here they are: links 'a plenty.

The Talent Myth. 2 guesses why I like this one.

You can either worry about it, or get used to the new world, like the kids are doing. This is the kind of stuff I want to book about at some point.

Smart urban design.

Go TSA, go.

This was interesting, as was this. Not sure if anything will come of either.

Google link of the week: Why Ajax Failed (Then Succeeded)

Whisk and Ladle sounds about as cool a dinner as one could have in the city, or anywhere else for that matter.

Finally, some excellent Asimov reading.

Oh, and some music to read by, straight from the Paris metro.

Wrote this a couple years back. Followed up with this.

So...yeah. Almost 7 years now. And that's neither here nor there.

Still sick, stuck in Chicago til tomorrow night, tired and behind schedule on the project. Also, neither here nor there.

Been a lot of that, lately.

Happy Wednesday, or whatever you decide to call it.

Oh and kudos to you if you caught the subtlety in Google's mispelling of their logo today. I take the fact that I noticed it and figured it out as proof positive that I do know what its like to love someone on a daily basis enough to notice when they change something small. My someone just happens to be Google.

Well it hasn't quite been a week yet, so I'm making good on my last post's promise.

Roughly... end of November, that's when I last wrote a decent piece. A short bit in support of returning to conscription.

It was a good post because it didn't have anything to do with me.

What was different between me now and me 3 and half months ago? I had just spent some time in Greece, for one thing. That helps. I hadn't been exposed to the full brunt of this project yet, for another. I hadn't been travelling so regularly - that definitely has something to do with it. Not much else comes to mind.

So there it is.

I'm debating getting on the plane tomorrow, but not for profound reasons - I'm feeling rather flu-ish. Hit me last night after a big day of nothing. Met Dave for lunch and worked on the lesson I never ended up giving since I started feeling rough around dinner time and knew I'd wake up worse.

The week was about normal, although a pleasant exception was meeting up with Dawn on Wednesday to sample some of Chicago's finest French cuisine. Le Bouchon had a nice, crowded feel that a lot of NYC places do, however the crowd was definitely dying down by 9:30, when we left. I had the hanger steak, it was decent, as far as hanger steak goes.

Its freakin cold in Chicago. Everyone complains but I kind of like it.

And this week my goal is to write a decent post that has nothing to do with me. Baby steps.

...meaninglessness does not come from being weary of pain; meaninglessness
comes from being weary of pleasure. And that is why we find ourselves emptied of
meaning with our pantries still full. - Ravi Zacharias

Sitting in the pre-Super Bowl silence of the pad on a Sunday night - well, the silence that is b-sides of old U2 and Badly Drawn Boy and Van Morrison and whatever else the vast repository that is the home computer may decide to produce. Roommate is having a dozen or so people over for the game - Sunday night is about the last time I feel like being social these weeks, but hey - its the Super Bowl. Should be super - not being able to hear the game or ads over the din of the party, not to mention being generally alone while surrounded by people. Which is a state I'm fairly accustomed to, but do not enjoy so much in the sanctuary of the place that I live in.

Especially not up for it after a weekend where I was out Saturday and most of today for our winter youth leaders' planning retreat. It was good, but not exactly restful. I'm going to need next weekend, when it finally gets here.

Especially not up for it after this past week at work - its getting tough and while I'm certainly capable of delivering an excellent production, I've lost motivation. Doesn't mean I won't produce - my deeply instilled work ethic is more than enough to force that out of me, but there's just no zest in the formula at this point. I'm tired of business traveller hotels with their sandpaper towels, smoked-in rental cars that I'm too tired to exchange, dealing with masses of people who don't understand basic air travel etiquette, and having to find food at night when I'm in the office past when everything's closed.

I'm even more tired of my own whining. This week I've resolved to go back and find the last time that I wrote a positive post about something, anything, and then write about the difference between where I was then, and where I am now. I don't expect to remedy all matters, but at least force some reflection. Its not that things are all that bad right now anyhow - I still have a steady job at a great company, and love the church and youth group and friends I've been blessed with in the city that I love living in. Regardless of any need I may feel for change, I need to drop this habit of complaint I've weakened into. I didn't used to do that.

Pause for laundry and finishing the packing.

Billy Joel's singing the Anthem. Troops at attention in Bhagdad. Two African American coaches in the big game. Thunderbirds by night, 9g's in the tropical rain. Live, around the world, in 176 countries.

Snow.

Big fluffy white wet ones. Not cold enough yet for the more dry goodness, but I'm not near a mountain, so it doesn't really matter. For some reason, however, every time it snows my first reaction is always to check the texture and assess its ski-ability. Champagne pow makes me happier than wet cotton, but if its white and falling from the sky, its proof that God loves me and wants me to be happy, and that's the point of snow, at the end of the day. I went for an out-of-the-way walk to the grocery store for nothing at all that I needed just because it was falling.

Friday was slammed with work from home, then I was supposed to see End of Men with Mars but it turned into us meeting up with Jay at the pig - I haven't been there since the last time I was hanging out with the both of them. A few drinks turned into dinner and drinks turned into Dave's appreciation party for Jay for getting me promoted, so the night cost me a few hundred more than I normally plan for on a night out with Jay, but I owed it to him. I think.

Saturday was hanging with Jon, AM, Angie, and her friend Julia who came down with her for the day. Kind of a rotating mix of who hung with who when, but it was a good day. Any day you end up at Ulysses is a good day, even if you end up there with a splitting headache. Don't get those hardly ever.

Today was church, where my pen ran out of ink at the start of the sermon, which I H.A.T.E.. Writing is how I listen. Then it was like TWELVE (count 'em) kids at Senior High which was just plain scraping the awesome off your awesome boots.

But it was also kind of sad.

Ever since I've decided its time to go, it seems like most of my experiences here are both poignantly sad and yet filled with portent of a very necessary change. Everything just feels like its telling me that its my time to move on. I feel like I'll be back, somehow, someday. And I feel like I don't want it to be over just yet. But I also feel like the city is almost ready to wish me farewell - for now. I think I needed it to be saying that to me.

I guess I haven't blogged it yet, but I didn't really talk to many people about it til this past weekend - I've updated the resume and have been applying to a number of different international relief organizations. I particularly want to get involved with relief efforts for the refugees of the genocide in Darfur, which would likely involve a move to Chad. I've found a few positions that sound like good matches for my skill set, and I'm really praying that God will open up the right door at the right time.

And for the first time in my life, I really feel a strong desire to go to a new place and do a new thing. Mind you, I'm not claiming its the guidance from God I've been seeking for so long - for all I know this could be a terrible decision - but I am saying that I really, really want to do this. I want to help people.

I'm sick of helping American corporations make money. I'm even a little tired of America itself, I think. I want to go somewhere else for a while. I want to get rid of a bunch of my stuff, throw the rest in a storage unit, and just leave. I want to help people.

And speaking of wants, I don't know if I'll ever fall in love, but I'd at least like, just once, to have a nice long walk in the snow with a girl that appreciates God's goodness in frozen form as much as I psychotically do.

And that's my best shot at a female form, at least from waist up. I don't know what I like about it in particular so much as the fact that I just feel that I got it as right as a pencil ever could have. The subject will remain unidentified, but I reiterate: this one caught the moment perfectly - perhaps better than anything else I've ever drawn. (Same deal, full size .jpg if you click on it - I think it looks even better close up)

For some stupid reason, when life gets tough, I get creative. I have no idea why, but its only in the downers that I seem to play my guitar plenty, begin putting together new book sketch-outs, pull out some of the old sculpting stuff, and, when its really all hit the fan, start drawing again.

Did all of my best drawing back after college. It was the closest I ever came to doing some good human form sketches, and one or two shots at actual faces, which to my dying day will be the hardest thing in existence to draw accurately.

I've drawn a few of pieces since that time but nothing (save one, perhaps) of any significance. Until this Fall. We were somewhere on our trip to Greece and someone mentioned something in passing about how great it would be if Robbie could do some paintings of some of the wonderful sights we were seeing. Now let it be known that I will not go near paint, because I have only lowly lead-sketching skills, and even those are rough and untrained. But, the thought occurred to me at the time that I might put a couple small pieces together for both the 'rents and the 2 sisters for Christmas. I wasn't seeing anything that they seemed to like that either a) they weren't already buying for themselves or b) I didn't see as a good fit for a gift from me, and so I thought combining a little of my time and (arguably) talent with the Greek countryside / infrastructre might make for nice Christmas gifts.

Things weren't really going rough come the trip to Greece, but I did have a formidable new project on the horizon which has since lived up to its formidity, along with everything else that transpired in the last few months. So, although I wasn't planning to be in a state to draw well, there I found myself. In retrospect, perhaps that was part of what led me to where I am now. That's rather beside the point now, though.

A couple of weeks ago I finally threw a bunch of my work, old and new, into a portfolio and took it by Cregan's office to scan it all for posterity. And you are now the benefactor of this effort, in both this and subsequent posts, to follow.

This one is the Acropolis at Rhodes, off of a picture I took facing towards it from the west, along the side of the road up from town that Joey and I were motorbiking up. The sun was behind the clouds as it set in the afternoon, and it didn't really come out how I would have liked because in the end, the clouds are shaded and the sky isn't, and it really should be the reverse. Even though the sunlight was coming in from behind the clouds in the picture, the sky behind it was such a deep blue that the clouds really became brilliantly white, and everything in the foreground (trees, Acropolis, ground, etc.) all had a contrast of almost completely dark, from the angle we were facing it. That said, I think it still came out alright, with the color scheme flip for everything that isn't on the ground. This is Mom and Dad's present, mounted in a nice frame (not pictured).

(Clicking on it takes you to the full size version, which unless you have a computer / monitor setup that I sincerely lust for, your browser is not going to fit. Hint: right click, save as...)

Well its not that I haven't been writing... so much as I haven't been writing here.

Work. Life. Youth Group trips to Young Life camp. Work. Travel. Life.

None of it is a sufficient excuse to free me from the bond of writing I at one point sought to place upon myself. Now, its just work and travel and life...friggin life. Life keeps getting in the way of my attempts to make something of it. And lately life is work and details and vodka and swimming and youth group and reading and whatever.

Its all keeping me from the GRE's and going back to school and throwing caution to the wind and actually submitting another article or two to a big magazine or the Times or whatever. It makes me mad and yet I'm indifferent enough that the anger is only temporary to the moment. Tomorrow I'm going to wake up and only my 6 am call is going to matter, and then my 7:30. The fact that I have calls at these hours speaks to my commitment to change things, or rather, my lack thereof.

So there you have it, some blogging. I stayed up for this.

I never should have gone to college. I should have stuck with skiing, maybe made something of myself with it, maybe had a few knee surgeries...

but at least, with the failure, I would have known that I gave it a shot.

I start to feel like I can’t maintain the facade any longer, that I may just start to show through. And I wish I knew what was wrong. Maybe something about how stupid my whole life is. I don’t know. Why does the rest of the world put up with the hypocrisy, the need to put a happy face on sorrow, the need to keep on keeping on?... I don’t know the answer, I know only that I can’t. I don't want any more vicissitudes, I don't want any more of this try, try again stuff. I just want out. I’ve had it. I am so tired. I am twenty and I am already exhausted. - Elizabeth Wurtzel

Yeah so blog fell by the wayside yet again. I'd say I have hopes of resurrecting the writing in '07 but that would pretty much jinx the whole thing. If I blog even close to what I got out this past year, I'll be doing good.

And so we start a new year, with the same tenor as the majority of last year - whining about my lack of time and inability to find the inspiration for decent writing, so much as pithy, pitiful journaling.

Well, on that note…

Worked the week before the long Christmas weekend in Chicago, and flew back to Cali the Thursday evening of that week. Sis and the grandparents met me at the airport, and I had my Weinerschnitzel rendezvous on the way home, and it was glorious. Friday I worked from Panera, and after my calls I remember deciding to pack it in and start the holiday a little early, thinking "hey I'll find time to get this done during next week at some point." Which never happened, which will make tomorrow a bear - seeing as I do not have the energy or motivation for it this evening.

Back to the weekend. I think we had people over for dinner on Friday night. Joey's piano teacher and his family. This guy is a virtuoso of sorts and Joey's been growing by leaps and bounds - I wish I could have gotten that kind of training instead of my classical one, I could be that classy wine-bar / event pianist I so often wish I was instead of flying to Chicago every week to get more technical.

Saturday we definitely did something. I don't remember what, but probably multiple things. I think maybe I took my shirts to the dry-cleaner and went to Ikea to get frames for my as-yet-unfinished Christmas presents. I think all of this may have been on Friday afternoon, but I'm pretty sure it was Saturday. Who knows.

Sunday was church with the fam, morning and evening. Margy and Jonny got in from their cross-country drive early in the AM and woke up in the afternoon to go to the evening service with us.

Monday was Christmas. I wore an army helmet all day long. This pretty much took care of my annual ruining-of-the-serious-Christmas-pictures tradition. And it felt in-character for the amount of Wolfenstein I was playing with Peter and Joey throughout the day.

Tuesday. Tuesday was Tuesday. That's about all I think I will ever write about that day, for the rest of my life.

Wednesday Jonny and Joey and I headed up into the snowy Sierras and they boarded while I picked up telemark and fell in love with skiing all over again for the very first time, which was pretty much exactly what I needed. Not that I don't love alpine and twin tips and dropping huge sketchy lines and massive cat-tracks and the like, but I distinctly remember sitting on the lift and having a kind of morose "is this as good as it gets?" moment. Granted, it was kind of colored by my getting older and dealing with life situations and a lot of stuff I've had to deal with lately, but the feeling was distinctly related to skiing at that moment, which was a complete first in my life.

And then my heels were set free, and life on snow was new again. I'm really looking forward to getting back on tele's and getting better at it. It’s the hardest discipline on the mountain and I'm excited about the challenge.

We did dinner with the fam at the Mac Grill that night, which although I was really tired and mentally exhausted, was still a good time.

Thursday I was just plain dead, body burning from the new skiing regimen. We all headed up to the grandparents' to meet up with mom's sister and her kids there, my two wonderful cousins that I haven't seen in way too long, who I hope get out to visit me in NYC sometime soon. We older sibs/cousins all took off for a couple beers and smokes (sans cancer for me, thanks) at a bar on the strip in Nevada City after dinner, and stayed there until mom called to tell us we were being rude. Back for more presents and games and then back home, where it was packing for my departure for Dallas on Friday morning.

Which is a whooole nother story…