6'-1" and counting

So I help out with Awana, and this Wednesday, we were supposed to dress up as what we want to be when we grow up. Now, seeing as to the fact that I am in college, I don't have that many things to dress up in. The only thing I had was my old high school football jersey, which I wore. It's kind of contradictory when you think about it, because I was saying that I wanted to be a football player by wearing a jersey that I actually played football in. But this post is not about the philosophical reasoning behind wearing things from the past to hint as to what I want to do in the future (sorry if I lost you there, I reread it and actually lost myself). What I am writing about is that the events of last night got me reminiscing about what I wanted to be when I was little thinking about when I grew up. I will try to avoid the age-old joke that my dad still uses to this day by saying that I wanted to be tall (sorry if it's too late already). So here we go...

I think the very first thing I wanted to be as far as I can remember was a football player, just as all little boys want to be. I think it might be a requirement for every boy. You shouldn't be allowed to grow up until at some point you want to be a football player or at least play some other sport for a living. I don't quite remember how long that phase lasted, but once it went away, I believe that I then wanted to be a video game tester. This is also a desired job that is held by young boys, although not as big as football. Just think about it. You could just play video games all day long and then tell people how to make the game better, then you'd be able to play the newly improved game, so the gaming experience would just get better and better as you went along. Thankfully, this was merely a wishful desire for me, because now I don't find video games anywhere near as appealing as I did when I was younger and I think I would seriously go insane if I had to sit in front of a television all day long.

Okay, new paragraph. I don't really need a new paragraph because I'm not changing my train of thought (although I am now because I am talking about paragraphs). I only wanted a new paragraph because the previous one was getting rather long and I learned in my technical communications class last year that long paragraphs can be daunting for readers. White space is good (our professor repeated this concept quite often, so it is ingrained in my brain). So I was actually thinking about all of you who are reading this as I made a new paragraph, because I don't want to scare you off with what appears to be an endless mass of words. So you can skip this section if you would rather have the flow of the story rather than my justification of my paragraph breaks, although now that I think of it, you couldn't have known that you could have skipped this section until you had read and gotten to this point. Sorry about that. I didn't learn how to organize paragraphs very well, only that long ones are bad. And now this paragraph is rather long and I think it's time for another new one.

My eyes would probably eventually fall out, and that would not be good. After my desire to be a video game tester died off, I wanted to be a roller coaster tester, but I figured that this might be a little dangerous since I would have to be the first one to ever ride the roller coaster, so there would be an immense possibility of me getting thrown off and getting killed. Not cool. From there I decided that I wanted to be a basketball player (yep, back to sports), but this quickly went away because I find out that it's a lot harder than it looks to put a ball into a 10 foot basket on a consistent basis. After that I wanted to be a computer programmer, but I decided against that much for the same reasons as wanting to be a video game tester. Then I wanted to be a crime scene investigator. This was mainly due to the fact that CSI was a new show and it was and still is awesome. This was probably the first career that I considered for what I would do in college, but after a little bit more research on it, I found that real crime scene investigation is nowhere near as cool as what they made it out to be on T.V. It was rather depressing actually. The next thing I wanted to be was an architect. This was because I like to design things, especially floorplans for houses. This was the first career that I seriously considered. I went to an architecture workshop at UNL over a week during the summer a few years back and did all of my campus visits looking at their college of architecture.

(New paragraph, same justification)

It wasn't until I knew I was coming to UNL that I realized that I didn't want to do architecture. I found that it was much to artsy for me. I still liked designing things and I was pretty good at math and science so I figured that engineering would be good. So I switched my major from architecture to civil engineering, but then I decided that I didn't want to be designing bridges and roads for my whole life. So then I switched my major to mechanical engineering (if you happen to know what they actually do, feel free to clue me in). So that is what I am working on right now, and I guess we'll see if what I want to be when I grow up changes any more.

Somewhere between duck calls and change

So, kind of a funny story. At least I think so.

As some of you may know, I had the opportunity to go down to Ecuador for a missions trip. My friend Mitchell and I stayed with a family down there (they had 1 daughter and 1 son) and we kind of became part of their family while we were there. Once we got back, we decided that we should get them something to say thank you for the use of their home. We just now got around to actually getting what we wanted to get for them. For the parents we got coffee, for the girl we wanted a teddy bear with something with Huskers on it, and for the boy, we wanted to get a football, as opposed to a futbol, which is all they have down there. So here is where the story actually takes place.

In order to get what we wanted for the kids, we decided that the best place to go would be Scheels because it seems like they have everything, at least everything that is somewhat related to sports. So we went at like 8:45 on Tuesday night, hoping that they would still be open. Low and behold, they closed at 9, so we were able to look for about 15 minutes. We found the bear right away and didn't have much discussion about that because guys just don't talk about bears or stuffed animals in general. But when it came to the football, it took us at least 10 minutes to pick out the right one, because as you know, footballs are very important items and can't be decided upon in a hurry. We had to find the right size and make sure it was appropriately pumped up and we had to decide whether or not we wanted to have a Nebraska logo on the side; there were just so many things we had to figure out.

Well during this whole time, there were probably, I would have sworn, to be about 200 kids running around with duck calls and they were blowing them constantly. Now I hadn't noticed them much, or at least hadn't been bothered by them very much, but at one point in time, I looked over at Mitchell and his eyes were wide open and he just says, "I want to kill those ducks." What made it worse was that as soon as he said that, one of the kids came over and blew her little duck call right at us, as if she knew what Mitchell had just said and was doing this as an act of defiance.

So we finally came to a decision regarding the football, which was good because they actually started turning the lights out on us. So we went to go checkout with our teddy bear and football. Now somehow I had accumulated probably a pound of change that previous week, and I absolutely hate carrying change around, except I do need at least two coins so that I can move them around in my pocket (I don't just move them around randomly, I actually have a pattern that I do - just ask and I'll show you if you're really that interested), but this is all beside the point. Hold on while I go back and read what I've written so far so that I can get back on track.

Okay. So I had a lot of change. I decided that this would be a perfect place to get rid of some of it. I had a gift card, so I gave that to the cashier and told her to be patient with me because I had a lot of change that I wanted to get rid of. I realized as soon as I started counting it that this was probably the last person that this cashier would check out for the day, and here I am giving her a ton of change to count. I apologized and told her that I hoped that she hadn't had a bad day because I would probably come off as a huge jerk. Now, for some reason, Mitchell and I became extremely talkative, more so than we had been while we were there; perhaps it was the sight of my literal handful of change that put a lighter mood on the ordeal. So we started talking back and forth and actually were asking the cashier questions assuming that she wanted to be a part of our conversation. It was one of those things where if you were on the outside looking in, it would appear to be really funny and random I think. Here is a little bit of the dialogue that went on while we were checking out:

Me: "I'm really sorry, but I need to get rid of this change. I hope you haven't had a terrible day, because this will probably make me look like a huge jerk."
Cashier: "No, it's okay."
Mitchell: "Do those kids always blow those duck calls?"
Cashier: "Yea, pretty much."
Mitchell: "Isn't that annoying?"
Cashier: "Yea"
Me: "Okay, how much is that?"
Cashier: "Three dollars"
Me: "Okay, hold on."
Mitchell: "I don't think I could work here with all that going on."
Me: "Okay, there's 44 cents. How much more do I owe you?"
Cashier: "Nine dollars"
Mitchell: "That was a lot of change. Do you feel lighter now?"
Me: "I kind of do actually. I'm so glad I was able to get rid of all of that."
Me(talking to Cashier): "Again, I'm really sorry."
Cashier: "It's fine"
Me: "I think that is the most change I've ever used in one place."
Mitchell: "I bet."

This conversation was not drawn out at all either. It probably took place about as fast as you just read it. And this was only a snippet of what our conversation consisted of; there was plenty more that I don't remember fully. In the end, I used precisely $3.44 worth of change (told you I had a lot), and it felt really good to get rid of it. Now what made this whole thing funnier was that as we were leaving, Mitchell started talking about what just took place. I probably wouldn't have had a second thought about it, but Mitchell just started laughing about how funny our whole ordeal with the cashier was. This got me to realize how odd and comedic it was and we started discussing whether or not we were a pain to the cashier or if we were entertaining. I said that if I would have been in her place and had a long day like I'm assuming she had, I would have found us entertaining. But maybe it was more wishful thinking. Well, anyways, we convinced ourselves that we were more entertaining than annoying and left it at that.

Hopefully this wasn't a long, boring story. I found it pretty funny, but maybe it was just one of those things where you had to be there.

Guitars rock...literally

So, I think I realized the other day how much I really go love the guitar. I mean, ever since I started playing, I've always enjoyed it, but it wasn't until this weekend that I truly realized how much I really like it. Now, I've grown up in a music family: my dad is a music professor here at UNL, and his dad was a high school music teacher, so music has certainly been a big part of our family. This may be the reason I like guitar so much, but then I realized that I hated playing the piano and violin when I was younger, so that couldn't be the case. At least not entirely.

Like I said, I've always enjoyed playing. I wasn't too keen on playing for church group or in front of lots of people, but I would just mess around on my own quite a bit. But as I got better, I started to like it more and more, and was more and more comfortable playing in front of other people. I guess when it comes to music, I like sounds much more than voices. That's why I will listen to artists with pretty bad voices; as long as their music is good. So when I am playing and get a sound that I like, (and I am not trying to make myself sound like the best guitar player in the world, because I am most certainly not), it makes me really happy and I can play it over and over again. Plus, I really like playing in a band setting with another guitar and drums and all that, because it is probably one of the greatest feelings to be able to "rock out" as so many people have said.

Perhaps at this point I should inform you as to what caused me to come to this stunning revelation of how much I like guitar. Like I said, it wasn't too long ago that I didn't really like getting in front of people and playing. But before the weekend came around, I was asked by the youth pastor at my church if I would play for the high school Sunday school class. Not only did I agree to do it, but I found myself actually wanting to and was looking forward to it for the rest of the week. So I started to wonder what made me want to get in front of people with the possibility of messing up and making a huge fool of myself - I would then go into deep depression and my self-esteem would drop like a rock, and I would probably go into some sort of shock and never be able to talk or move again. (Okay, so maybe that's a little far-fetched, but who knows, the snowball effect can be pretty dangerous sometimes).

Well first off, I found that playing guitar is a big release for me. Whenever I'm doing homework or have had a busy day, I can just pick up the guitar and start playing and feel a lot better when I am done. I think it's one of those things where I could probably just play it until my fingers fell off, which may not be a good thing (not that my fingers would fall off, but that I could waste that much time playing it). But it is something that I rarely get bored of.

Secondly, I think that (and hope that) the main reason I like it so much is the ability to worship God with it. Worship is a big thing in our family, more so than music, and I have always felt that it is one of the most important things that we can do in our Christian walk. Worship is basically what we think of God and how that makes us respond. My dad used to be the worship leader at our church, and my mom was nearly as active in that as my dad was, so I grew up seeing the value that they put on worship and have hopefully taken some of that for myself. When I realize that when I am playing for either the college or high school group, or sometimes even the entire church body, I am bringing them before the throne of God in worship, and that is a humbling and even frightening thought, much more than the thought of messing up. So when I realize that, I am more worried that my heart is in the right place and that I am prepared to come before God. When I start playing, I find that I block out everyone else around me, and just focus on the song and what I am singing, which is why I am not as concerned about how well I do. But hopefully, it is the aspect of worship that makes playing the guitar so enjoyable for me.

As I look back on this, I can see how it will probably be long and boring for those of you who are reading. I apologize and I will wrap this up now.

So I really do like playing the guitar, maybe more than I should and I probably waste more time than I should on it. But I guess there are worse things I could be doing with my time (like homework :)) and if it helps me worship God better than I would without it, well, then I wouldn't trade it for the world.

Cold water really does trump all

So it's been a while since I posted on here last, but I did warn you that I might neglect this blog for long periods of time. Nevertheless, I am posting now, and hopefully it will have been worth the wait. Well I will try to post on here a little more regularly, so my minions of dedicated readers *hopes desperately* can check back more frequently.

There was a question that came up a few days ago and it went something like this: "If you could be any animal, what would you be?" My first inclination was to blurt out "cheetah!", for somewhat obvious reasons. But after thinking about it, I realized that even though I would be able to run really fast, I wouldn't be able to do much else. So then after thinking for a little while longer, I thought it might be cool to be a gecko. For those who don't know, geckos have the amazing ability to walk on walls and ceilings because they basically have suction cups on their feet. But then I got thinking again, and as cool as it would be to have suction cup feet, I realized that geckos are really small and probably can't get around really fast, which is the main reason I originally wanted to be a cheetah. Plus, I found out from those Geiko commercials that geckos have a British accent, and I definitely don't want to have a British accent. So then I thought maybe I could be like a hybrid animal - a cross between a cheetah and a gecko. I would have the cheetah's speed and accent, and the gecko's suction cup feet. I figured that this might not be the greatest since this type of animal doesn't exist, and if it did, it would probably the weirdest looking thing in the entire universe, and I wouldn't like to be the weirdest looking thing in the entire universe. So basically, I had this huge dilemna on my hands, I didn't know what to pick: speed and quickness or suction cupiness? So I decided to just be a polar bear because they can swim in really cold water.

Let me ask you, if you could be one animal, what would you be and why? Let the comments flow...

Oh, and on an entirely different note, check out this awesome C.S. Lewis quote (Told you that you'd hear from him again). This is talking about those low times in life where it is hard to imagine that what is happening is in accordance with God's will - much like what happened to Job, although not necessarily limited to that degree.

"[Satan's] cause is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do [God's] will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of [God] seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys."

Mmm...Letters

So I've started reading The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, and I've really enjoyed it so far. It's somewhat of a difficult read and I'm only on chapter three, but as far as I can tell, it's going to be a great book. As you may know, I am a big fan of C.S. Lewis and I try to read as much of his stuff as I can. Well, this book that I'm reading, for those who don't know, is basically letters from the devil (Screwtape) talking to one of his demons (Wormwood) informing him of how to, in essence, destroy Christianity. Each chapter is a different letter adressing a different way that Satan tries to destroy the Christian faith.

The first chapter brought up the fact that there are so many different religous philosophies that people have just started to accept them rather than think through them and come to a logical conclusion. Now this book was written back in 1941 I believe, and it is amazing how this is still true today. As a society, we have become so tolerant of all these different philosophies and just accept them into the big schmorgisboard of beliefs. Nobody argues anymore. Arguing is a good thing. It forces people to think about what they're saying and see if what they believe makes sense. So basically Lewis says that Satan steers us away from argument and towards acceptance of all of those philosophies that are out there.

So, yeah, good book and you'll probably hear some more thoughts on it at some later point in time.

My first post

So here is my first post on my first blog, so I hope it comes out to be everything a first post on a first blog should be. I'm actually probably going to make up a bunch of stories just because sometimes telling my life as a student can be boring sometimes. Not that I'm unhappy with where I'm at, it's just that the only things I would be able to say are that I woke up, ate and went to class for the day. Not too exciting. So I'll try to keep it interesting and mix it up here and there. I just think that this whole blog thing for me will be really random in what I choose to write about. I'll probably have a bunch of stories and also some personal opinion posts, like I said: random. Well, hope you enjoy and I'll see where the posts take me.