Last week I went to North Dakota again. No tickets this time, woohoo! Anyways, I've been pretty busy so I haven't had much time to blog. I'll put this quick one up though to tide you over until next time. Last Monday, when I was going through security at the airport, I was wearing these huge boots that were required for my work. They were fiberglass toe instead of steel toe cuz in really cold areas the steel can freeze your foot. So the security guy tells me, "You might want to take those off." And I said, "There's no metal in them." And he said, "Ok, let's give it a try." I knew if I was wrong then I would have to be taken to the side for extra screening but I had plenty of time anyways and I really didn't want to take those boots off. Anyways, I walked through and sure enough not hint of metal. The security guy says, "Son of a gun, it worked!" Anyways, I was feeling pretty cool that I fooled the security guy and then I had this scary thought. So I'm wearing these boots with a fiberglass toe, a substance hard enough to replace a steel toe and the metal detectors didn't catch it cuz they aren't made out of metal. Then I thought, what other kinds of things could be made out of fiberglass that can be taken through screening. Why can't you use fiberglass to make a knife? or a gun? Well on that note, I'm flying again tomorrow, ha ha.

So Amy's blog about the accident reminded me of one I witnessed a couple years ago. I was on my way to work driving on the 405. It was a pretty normal drive, the flow of the traffic was about 70 mph. I was in the #2 lane and there was this guy on a motorcycle in the fast lane (#1) ahead of me. He must have hit an oil slick or something cuz his bike shimmied really weird and then it went sideways and he just fell over it. His bike skidded off ahead of him while he just tumbled on the freeway. You never know what you'll do in these kinds of situations. The first two thoughts that came to my mind were 1) this can't be really happening and 2) does anyone else on the freeway notice this is happening or is it just me? My eyes were fixated on the guy so I didn't look anywhere else. I was amazed that our deceleration took a very long time although I wasn't sure how long it was, but we must have gone 200 yards before stopping. I can't remember if I was yelling or just thinking really loud, "stop skidding!". I remember praying too. The guy was wearing a helmet and had a pretty tough leather jacket on. He was pretty much spinning like a top on his back which probably kept him from breaking every bone in his arms and legs.

He came to a stop in front of the car next to me. I don't think my mouth could have been open any wider. And I watched this guy slowly stagger to his feet and WALK over to the center divider. I couldn't believe he was ok! Then this huge Hummer pulls in front of us (like I was going to hit the guy or something, I was already stopped, sheesh!) By then there were like 10 people talking to the guy. He was really shaken up and pretty bruised, but he looked like he was going to be alright. It was so amazing! Then I called 911 which I think was the first time I've ever called it. And man, let me tell you, I was no help at all. I couldn't remember where I was on the freeway or even what freeway I was driving on. All I could say was, "a man just bailed on his motorcycle on the freeway!" and then I can't remember what she asked, but I do remember all my responses were "I don't know". And finally she says, "Is it on the 405 near the airport?" And I said, "yeah" and I thought, "how did she know that?". So then I'm thinking rationally again and I realize that people were probably calling as soon as the guy tumbled. I was too busy trying not to run over the guy. Anyways, I wanted to pull over and help the guy, but there was such a crowd of people there already, I couldn't imagine what help I could offer, and I was just blocking traffic so I decided to keep driving. It was pretty amazing what I had just seen, but I never saw any mention of it on the news or in the newspaper. I wonder how many amazing things happen that nobody really knows about except the people who were there.

So you always wonder what kind of person you would be in the event of an emergency. From this experience, I learned I'm the guy that has to be shaken back into reality to be of some use, ha ha.

My new small group at LCC is challenging us with memorizing verses. I think the easiest ones to memorize are the ones you pick yourself. Here's mine for this week:

Psalm 119:9-11

9How can a young man cleanse his way?
By taking heed according to Your word.
10With my whole heart I have sought You;
Oh, let me not wander from Your commandments!
11Your word I have hidden in my heart,
That I might not sin against You.

I'm not very good with memorizing verses, but I don't think it's due to a bad memory. If I can remember like 200 episodes of the Simpsons and all the dialogue from Monty Python's Holy Grail, then why can't I memorize some short passages from the Bible? It's a discipline.

I'm kinda hooked on the picture thing. I wonder what the limit on space is? Pictures in blogs are fun for those times when you want to read a blog, but you don't want to read alot.


Guess which one is my brother?

People often ask me if I'm the funny one in the family. I think we all have good senses of humor, but my brother, Micah, is the funniest person I know. He's been making me laugh his whole life.

Last weekend I went to an outdoor wedding. A lady played this song on a keyboard and had her sheet music just sitting there shaking in the wind. Wouldn't you know it just as she finishes the intro and the vocalist is about to begin, the sheet music falls down and now she has to go by memory. Luckily the music didn't blow away, so someone in the front row was able to set it up again fairly quick, but the damage was done. The music was a bit off and so was the vocalist. They both seemed to try to find each other in the song. Sometimes the music was ahead and sometimes the vocalist was ahead. The wedding was really low key though so I don't think it really mattered that much to the couple getting married. I think they were just happy to finally be at their wedding day. I still can't get that song out of my head though.

I don't know about you, but at a lot of weddings, I get these refrigerator magnets with a picture of the couple on them with the date of the wedding. Over some time, we collect quite a few of these (sometimes multiples of the same couple since my roommates get one too). So I'm staring at these magnets on our fridge and realize, "these people do not have a picture of me on their fridge", and I don't talk to them nearly enough to warrant having them on mine. So the solution is not to take theirs down, but to make a magnet of me and my roommates (or just me) and give it to them to put on their fridge. I figure some of these people owe me a couple years of display time at this point. Ha ha. Can you imagine, what would people think when they see 3 guys on a magnet? What would the date be? Or if I just made one of me, I could have a cool pose like the one in my profile pic, and the date could be my birthday or something. Yeah, watch out you married couples, I'm gonna be on your fridge soon! You owe me!

Happy anniversary to my blog! Well, it was actually a couple days ago. Anyways, since you guys seem to like weird French stuff so much. Here's a big thumb. This is near La Defense near downtown Paris.


A very large thumb. It's hard to see, but I'm giving a "thumbs up" as well.


It even has a finger print, or should I say a thumb print?

Anyways, thanks to those that looked at my profile. Sorry if you expected to read more. I never know what to put on those things. I have so many pictures I want to use for my profile. Anyways, since I'm on the Paris Museum of Modern "Art" subject for my profile, I'll share some others. I don't put nearly enough photos on my blog. So I'll start putting more up just cuz they are silly and fun.


If you were trapped in one of those "color by number" coloring books, it would look something like this.



Yes, an actual exhibit. And to think, without this art, I would have been less cultured.

I went to Utah today. One thing I just don't understand is every single time I get on a plane, I cannot stay conscious. I'm usually out even before the plane takes off. I'm not sure why because I get plenty of sleep. It's not just a sleepy kind of tired either. It's a crazy groggy kind of tired. This is my theory...they are pumping pure oxygen in the plane for everyone to breathe. It affects me more because I live in L.A. and I'm used to breathing dirty air all the time. So then my brain is sensing this pure air and it's processing it and saying, "what is this foreign gas, it must be poisonous, turn off everything", ha ha. What an engineery explanation, ha ha! I'm cracking myself up here.

Anyways, I'm not crazy about travel, but at least when I travel I have stuff to do. The last two weeks sure didn't account for very much work. Some people think that's like the best job, but I think it's really boring and not very worthwhile at all. All this travel is getting to me, but I don't want to leave the project cuz I know there isn't much else to do at the office. I'm really in the best place I can be so I'm just going to make the best of it.

Anyways, since I was pretty bored at work the last couple days, I've been reading other people's blogs. Most of them are Xanga blogs and they are all people I know mostly, but probably not that well. So while I read their blogs I'm wondering if it's like spying or something. Like if a guy reads a girl's blog, she would probably think that was kinda creepy. But if a guy read another guy's blog, he probably wouldn't care. And if a girl read a guy's blog, that would be awesome. And then depending on how well you know the person, you could always just comment on their site and then they know you read their blog. But if you don't know the person that well, and then you post a comment, that would probably make the person think, "how freaky". Anyways, what do you do with that info you learn about the person on their blog, do you pretend you don't know it? Ha ha. On the flip side, you could say that if you put it on the internet, you should expect for anyone to read it so in that case would anyone care? I don't think everyone thinks that when they blog though. Thoughts anyone? Anyways, I know there are some people reading this blog and have been silent either because they know me but not that well or they haven't talked to me in a long time or they just don't know me and found this blog on one of their random searches. Anyways, I hardly consider this blog private so drop a line. I'm always flattered that people take the time to read my blog.

Finally added a picture up there and if you click on it, you can see my way detailed profile. The picture is from the Paris Museum of Modern Art. It's a very strange place, but one of the few places that were open on New Years' Day.

This past week, my boss calls me and asks what's been going on. I say, um, nothing is going on. Nothing has happened since I've been here (in L.A.). He says, yeah I figured that. (???) Then he says, I should have told you to take some time off or something. I jump on that, "Can I take Friday off then?"

Friday

It's my day off. People ask me what I did with my day off. Why is everyone so surprised that I did nothing? I ran a couple errands and just chilled. The rest of the weekend was busy.

Saturday

I went to UCLA vs. SDSU at the Rose Bowl with Rojas. I usually see about one every season. I'm not much of a sports fan, but going with Rojas makes it more fun cuz he's so live or die by it. It was a pretty good game.

Sunday

I joined my church's set up ministry. Since we meet at a high school, the church has to be set up every morning before service. The first time I went was because they needed volunteers from each Bible study to help out so I volunteered. But I saw that they really needed help every week and it was really no problem for me to be there at 8:30. They always say, "Thanks for coming SO early." Ha ha. When I went to Grace, we started that early every Sunday. It felt weird starting church at 10:30, so now I feel better about coming early to help. Anyways, this week, the youth pastor, Gavin, comes and gets me and Chane for help. None of the other youth leaders were able to make it so he needed us for their scheduled breakfast event. So we helped drive the junior high and high schoolers to the nearby burger joint.

Hanging out with the kids was alot of fun. All the guys ordered fries and a coke for their breakfast, ha ha. And one of the high school girls was like, "I don't know what to order, tell me what to order." I was tempted to say, fries and a coke, but I didn't. Anyways, I wasn't sure which group of kids Gavin wanted me to sit with so he motioned me and Chane to sit with the high school girls, and Gavin hung out with all the guys. You would think this would be somewhat of an uncomfortable situation, but this is not the first time this has happened to me. Being in Belarus for two trips and have nothing but high school girls to teach made this experience pretty normal. Ha ha. They would tell us all these funny things. "This boy when his friends are not around, he can be really nice and stuff, but when his friends are there, he's soooo immature." Ha ha. I wish I could remember more of what was said, but I can't. Gavin is still hoping the youth group with get a junior high girl to balance the junior highers out. I think that will change everything, but I doubt it will make it easier, ha ha.

Our church meets in the cafeteria of the school. At least I'm pretty sure it's the cafeteria, but there aren't any tables there. Anyways, this week the school had put up some milk ads that were a bit distracting. I would say they are only distracting because of the cool and hip image they are trying to give milk so that kids can say, "wow, milk is so cool, I'm going to drink that instead of coke!" Anyways, judge for yourself, these were the three in our church: 1 2 3 I really don't need to make fun of these with my own commentary. Just read the captions for yourself. These are funny by themselves, but imagine seeing these in your church sanctuary only adds to the humor. I guess we lucked out cuz on the website, I found some worse ones. So I'm glad we didn't have this one or this one or even this one. You can see the rest of them here. They are all pretty silly. Man, who would of thought milk could be so cool?