Focus

three parts that make a camera work

Object: to focus on

lens: to focus

Film: to absorb what is focused on


so...
object: always GOD.
always always always

Film: you

Lens: ?

so tell me,
have you used your experinces in life reguardless of what they were as a lens... (Romans 8:28)
or a lens cap?

Is your life a lens to others..... (Matthew 5:16)
or a lens cap?

just curious.

dang, just....... dang

first off, a shout out to jenna and andy's mom whom I met in bluff-town.

HI

Second off, shout out to all out of towners that are stopping in for a peek.
hi, how are ya?
You can post a "fine how are you" if you want. I'm actually curious who all reads this thing.

Friday... at last.

So I sit here.

with my austin cheddar cheese crackers

and my dr pepper.

pondering..

wanting to stop everything

and listen to the rain fall for the rest of the day

wondering,

If I had a duck and a pickle....

then...

I'd be a happy man.

SING WITH ME!!!!

Click for a Karoke singers nightmare.

oh for petesake!

why OH WHY can't I just ONCE come back from lunch without WEARING any of it!

woulda

After sucha long weekend withOUT my beloved. I wonder how many people are sick of hearing about her? In my defense I only talked about her when I was asked and an occasional blurb about missing half of me. I guess I looked somewhat depressed cause I had three people ask me if someone shot my dog. That kinda made me smile. It was great to see a ton of people I haven't seen in a long time and it was Great to meet a bunch of new people form ohio but my heart was in sandeigo.

Man I'm turning out to be a sap.
Most definately gonna be kicked out of the he-man woman haters club.

An extreame heart felt thanks who put up with me this weekend while I was without my heart. You guys were great sports about it.

Tuesday that feels like a monday

Need a laugh?


what is the bear saying?

Stress

Somewhere in the neighborhood of 54 days 2 hours and and around 38 minutes.
again.. give or take.

what stresses me the most about all this, invitations. I hate it. Who gets a formal invitation? We worked it out. We can fit 70 guests each and that includes family. That's all that will fit in the church.

70 - family.

how are we gonna do this?

8 years in the young group, growing up in a church of 700 in attendance. Moving from Roanoke to morton to phoenix to fort scott. Developing extreamly close relationships at each place. So who comes? My grand parents and their children and their families are coming. Dad and Mom's side. There are some men that have been a father to me during the hardest times of my life. They and their families are coming. Know how much that leaves? You don't want to know. Chances are that someone is really gonna be hurt. Honestly, no one has fell thorugh the cracks in my mind. Every face is there is there in my mind and there isn't enough room in the bluffton church for all who mean a great deal to me to come. You know who you are. If you don't get an invitation, I didn't forget you and it breaks my heart that I can't invite all who I would like to be there. By no means an I telling anyone to not come. If you are planning on coming, then come. You will bless us by being there, just be ready to have standing room only. There will be a reception after church that there will be plenty of room at and two weeks later (weekend of 22&23) we are holding a reception in roanoke for all who couldn't be invited from central Illinois.

So Just to let you know specifically, it tears me up to send out a fraction of invites that are in my heart.
I love you and If you can't be there physcially I pray that you will be there for us spiritually by keeping us in your thoughts and prayers.

SO THE OTHER DAY......

Ya know It could be like last year and I would still say that...
anyhoo..

Since that fateful day that I bashed in the gas tank on the jeep (stupid boulder), my gas gauge has not been the most reliable thing in the world. As a result I pretty much have to guess by miles when I'm gonna run dry. So I'm driving down national street when it starts sputtering....

not good.

I hit the clutch and it dies right away, and i keep the clutch in knowing that in about a 3/4 of a mile there's a station I can fill up at no biggie. So I'm creeping along and stop about 50 feet short of the pump. No problem.... BUT here's where the madness starts... I get to the station and they tell me that the pumps are broken and they cant pump any gas.

My attitude: no problem, I'll walk home (4 blocks) get the truck and a gas can and go to the other station in town.

SO I start walkin. It's hot but not that bad. Give Janelle a call to pass the time. I get to the house, and can't find the big gas can. So I dump out the 2 gallon lawnmower mix gas can and take that. I fill it up and get back to the jeep.

Problem: gas nozzle is extremely short and has a funky safety thingy on the front.
Result: I only get like a gallon into the tank.
Attitude: no problem, the station is really close, I can make it.

So I had to hang up so I could use both hands to use the gas can. Made it to the gas station, Filled up the jeep, drove it back to my house and put it near the garage. I go to put the lawn mower gas back and sitting right by the jet skiis is a 5 gallon gas can full and ready. I kinda get flustered about wasting the lawn mower gas but oh well, back to the truck.

So I start walkin, It's gettin hotter. Give Janelle a call to pass the time. (who by the way is getting a kick outta all this).

I get to the truck.
Problem: I got a tad flusterd with not finding the 5 gallon gas tank that was hiding in the middle of plain sight.
Result: I left the keys to the truck in the jeep.

At this time Janelle is about dying and makes a comment about me "batting a thousand" at that point.

If I didn't have her laughter to listen to, I probably woulda been extremely frustrated right about then.

Then my phone dies.
attitude hits rock bottom:
stupid jeep, stupid keys, stupid truck, stupid phone, stupid hot weather, stupid fickle minded feather brained idiot.

So I walk back to the house, it's getting freakin hot, I grab my keys and start walking to the truck. I wouIda called Janelle but the phone is dead. I get to the truck which had better start or I'm gonna.. I have no clue. It starts I get home, it's kinda late and lay in bed vow not to walk anymore anywhere ever again.... and I realize, I'm hungry, I didn't eat yet.
nell, I need a hug.

I bet my Heavenly Father had a great time molding my personality to make me so....... me.
I could just see Him lookin down on me goin. "Hey Angels!! Come over here and get a load of this guy! I love him so much! He totally cracks me up! Look at him.... so cute how absent minded this kid is. I made him like that ya know. His wife is gonna get a kick outta that. Remember that time he found his stereo remote in the freezer.........."

:)

Little diddy called...

get me outta here.
mondays.. sheesh.

almost 5

Massive freakout friday. Simon is gone for two weeks so I'm the design department head. NO THANK YOU, HAVE A NICE DAY. Anyhoo, It's about done and I'm still alive.. kinda. I can't do anything with anymore files cause UPS leaves in about a hour and a half and it takes usually three to get a electronic file to hard copy proof. Doesn't matter anyway, all job's are done. It took me all day but I finally see the top of my desk. I'm gonna try not to sneeze as to not provoke job tickets to fall from the sky.

AND NOW on to concentrating on more important things, like....
I wonder what would happen if I ducttaped a buncha pigeons to bossman Lonnies dog and how I would go about doing that...
thoughts like that make me happy.

thursday afternoon freakout

NO MORE MONEY!!
LEFT IT AT THE HOUSE!!!!

NEED HELP!!! PLEASE CALL POLICE!!!

NEED DRPEPPER!!!!

ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful ifeelgoodifeelgreatifeelwonderful

(pant, pant)

I'm about five seconds from tearing up my clothes and standing in front of the company with a styrofoam cup asking everybody who passes by for spare change..... "com'on man help a fella whos down on his luck..."

WHO WILL GIVE ME TWO QUARTERS!!!! I NEED TWO QUARTERS!!!

(wimper)
please?....

66 days and around 45 minutes...

give or take...

iwasiwasiwas

I was gonna post this entire post in german....
But I don't feel like it now.

then I was gonna do this post in sign language but then I wondered how....
then I lost motivation.

I was gonna go ask esther if there was anywork for me to do...
but then I laughed so hard I cried, and then I decided to go get a drpepper.

I bent a paper clip into a triangle and then hooked it at the end with the tip sticking out of it and I am using it to play with the hair by my ear. Momma always said that it was time to get a haircut when I started playing with that.
but I'm not movitated, now I have a mop on my head.

Two years ago we had a Fort Scott invite. Canoeing, bonfire, the whole bit, (doing it again this year by the way). Warren K and myself hopped into sekan and I showed him some stuff on my computer. We brought in some gatorade. I forgot mine and left it by the computer..... and I look over and..... well
that has got to be some kind of record.

67 more days.
more like 66 and 22 hours.
give or take.

THINGS I LEARNED YESTERDAY:
• wild black berries rock
• 3000 pound cows can be timid
• hungry 12 year old boys can be courageous
• sun bleached cow bones are cool
• Mill Creek is an excellent permanent substitute for the Marmaton (I promised papajohn I wouldn't jeep in the marmaton anymore)
• the jeep had a ton more clearance then Janelle and I thought it did.
• the jeep still needs a lift kit.
• having the love of my life in town for a couple days made the simple things in life so much sweeter.

67 more days til we are completed as one
67 more days til we never have to say goodbye again
67 more days.

Westside Story

As janelle was working the night shift at the ICU this weekend, I had the priviledge of spending saturday evening at the theater park with alan.

We watched the live performance of westside story.
I'll sum it up for ya.

two gangs; some guys who grew up in new york that call themselves the jets and some guys who come from puerto rico that call themselves the sharks.

For some reason these guys just can't play nice and blame all their problems on each other, idiots.

SO theres a dance, both gangs are there. tony, (ex-jets, best friend of main jet) retired from the gang "looking for something more, something just around the bend" and some how finds it in a "PR" (puerto rico) hottie named Maria whos looking for the same thing.

side note: I about died when she started singing "I feel pretty, oh so pretty" song.

Tony meets meets Maria, Maria meets tony, they like each other, gangs freakout, knockdown dragout narrowly avoided.

A war council is set.

here is where my willing suspension of disbelief NAILED a brick wall.

Tony confesses his undying love, true devotion, forsaking all else, for her and only her and proclaims, in love, to never leave her blah blah blah.
Yeah, so what. been there done that.....
BUT NOT AFTER TWO HOURS OF FIRST MEETING HER.

Next day the two gangs are pulling a old testiment Israelites/Philistines thing and pull out their best man to represent the gang in a hand to hand fight.

after pretending to get married, 2 hour whipped boy gets persuaded by the PR hottie to try to stop the fight. in getting in the way, tony ends the life of best friend. Then, in total rage, end's life of sharks boss man. way to go tony, tell that one to the girl.

another brick wall...
"ummm.... yeah so I tried to stop the fight sweetie... but I kinda killed everyone in it instead... didn't mean to....forgive me?"

and she's like.....
"weeeeeeelllll.... ok."

so tony waits for girl as she deals with snoopy detective about fight and deaths, but catches rumor that hottie was shot and killed by jelious shark. So tony runs in the street yelling take me too! And in the final monents in his life sees the hottie looking for him, but gets shot and dies. hottie freaks out, grabs the gun and just about pulls a shakesphere, but wimps out and that's the end.

so umm....

Yeah i liked it.
The tough guys danced like fairys and everybody who was cool snapped their fingers while they walked.

moral of the story.....

TACT IS A GOOD THING. and you might want to wait a tad longer then 2 hours of first meeting then person to confess an undying love. Just a thought.