Blogs are the Devil

Testing, Part 2

2011-07-01T14:10:00.003-04:00

Ok, so it's been about 3 years since I commented on this thing. Does this still show up on anyone's feeds?

Testing

2008-06-22T09:05:00.001-04:00

If you still ever go on this, post a comment.

cutting forward

2007-01-19T01:20:00.000-05:00

Tiffany and I are moving into a new place next weekend, and in said new place, we'll have internet access. Is this good? Probably not. Does this mean that I'll start blogging again? Probably not. But at least I'll start foruming again.

cutting back

2006-10-13T16:33:00.000-04:00

So Tiffany and I are thinking seriously about cutting our internet. We already cut our cable a few months ago and that's gone very well. It'll save us another $60 a month to axe the compton. However, both of us have internet access at work, so we'll still be able to go on losetouch and write email, etc.

2006-10-01T18:54:00.000-04:00

from www.wikihow.com

2006-09-13T21:40:00.000-04:00

How to Dissuade Yourself from Becoming a Blogger

What a buzz all the bloggers are making these days! It seems like just about everybody is pouring their musings into a text box. Are you feeling tempted to start a blog of your own? Here are some ways to bypass the trend.

Steps

Find five completely random blogs, and read them daily for a month. After thirty days, you will absolutely dread your self-imposed requirement to read all that dreck. Any blog you create will most likely be on par with what you've been reading. Don't put anyone through that.
Consider that your voice, even if it is truly a good one, is a tiny peep against the massive wave of tripe out there. The odds of anyone you don't already know finding your blog are low.
Write on a regular basis in Wordpad instead. If that doesn't satisfy your urge, and you feel that you must post your blog online, then you might just be craving attention and validation--which you'll never truly find in a blog. If you give up on your Wordpad journal after about three days, you'll do the same with a blog that just takes up server space.
Ask yourself if you really have the time to commit to a blog. What about that treehouse you wanted to build? Or the book you wanted to write? Or the car you wanted to fix up? Or the restaurant you wanted to take your wife to? Or the new career you wanted to pursue? Instead of writing about pretty much nothing, or whining about all the things you wish you were doing instead, start doing something that'd actually be worth writing about. And if it's really worth writing about, you'll be having too much fun doing it to tear yourself away from it.

Labor Day weekend '06

2006-09-13T17:33:00.000-04:00

A couple weeks ago we met my parents half way so that we could visit. It was good times. This was our animal pose (i'm supposed to be cleaning my head, in case that was unclear).

"And sorry I could not travel both..."

2006-09-06T12:19:00.000-04:00

All the craziness over the job has settled, for those of you who don't already know. I'm now officially the Director of the Carey House in Laconia. But, fortune has smiled (or smirked, I should say) upon me, and I was able to keep one course at LCS, which will allow me to stay connected at the school and get some of my pent up teaching out.

I already started teaching my one class, which is called Philosophy II. We'll be reading through Peter Kreeft's The Best Things in Life, as well as Descartes' Discourse on Method, just to name the first couple. I'll be stealing some ideas Shumaker gave me for how to conduct the class. We'll go through Descartes using a method called "microexegisis," which is just a flashy way to say that all of the reading will be done in class, one sentence at a time. This, of course, is not the best way to read a book (which, in terms of philosophy, is to read the whole thing quickly straight through once and then go back and re-read it carefully, looking at each individual part), but will hopefully help the students think through the text with precision. Apparently, Shumaker learned about this method more in detail when he visited Gutenberg College in Oregon last January.

You've been warned

2006-08-27T21:09:00.000-04:00

For the two of you...ok, one.

2006-08-10T15:45:00.000-04:00

Shawn will probably have me assassinated, but I'll most likely be back at the school this year. If some retired PhD wants to teach Bible at a small Christian school than it might change, but probably not.

We're off for the next two weeks to Nova Scotia, but we'll be back with pictures for the two of you who look at this site.

Here's part of an article my pastor wrote in one of his weekly email updates:

Obviously, the reason for having a book table is to encourage our congregation to be reading good books. Such an encouragement is necessary because reading is an activity that is “at risk” in our culture. As many cultural observers have pointed out, the dominant influence of television, the internet, video games, etc. clearly indicate that we have transitioned away from being a word-based culture to being an image-based culture. This is far more significant than we may realize. Words communicate differently than images, and those whose participation in the world is primarily image-based will inevitably develop a different way of viewing the world, as well as a different sort of character.

Reading is an activity that requires discipline, an active use of the imagination, delayed gratification, and a willingness to set aside one’s own concerns in order to understand what someone else wants to convey to us. On the other hand, image-based activities such as television and video games cultivate a passive use of the imagination, shortened attention spans, and the demand for entertainment and instant gratification. Another way of putting this is to say that, while words are able to convey objective content, images are received much more subjectively. As a result, when the image overtakes the word as the dominant mode of communication in a particular culture, that culture becomes increasingly relativistic and individualistic. As Ken Myers writes “A culture that is rooted more in images than in words will find it increasingly difficult to sustain any broad commitment to any truth, since truth is an abstraction requiring language.”

Tiffany's birthday party!

2006-08-10T08:38:00.000-04:00

Poor adults vs. Rich kids

2006-08-02T10:03:00.000-04:00

I guess Shawn and I don't blog anymore.

Update: I've been working at the homeless shelter for a little over a month, I believe. It's been a great experience. It's a much more connected form of helping people than teaching. I help people find jobs and get the services they need. Just yesterday I hooked one of the residents up with parenting classes from a local Christian organization. This could change her whole life, for all I know. The change is physical and in sight. Of course teaching is shaping minds, but you always wonder how much good it's actually doing. I was shocked by many of the low grades on Final Exams last year. It made me wonder whether I was the only one who learned anything all year. And the best thing about working in the shelter...when I'm done with work, I'm done with work.
And the Salvation Army wants me to stay. They'd pay me a bunch more and I'd get full benefits, inluding retirement. It's tough to turn it down, but I think it's too late in the summer to tell my principal that I'm not coming back. Even April may have been too late.

gospel

2006-07-08T17:16:00.000-04:00

Another reason to not be jealous of teachers is that they typically have full time jobs in the summer.

I got a job working as the temporary Shelter Director of the Laconia Salvation Army "Carey House," which is one of the only homeless shelters in the county. They recently had to fire their previous Director and the S.A. captain was looking for a temporary replacement so that he wouldn't have to hire someone he didn't really want out of desperation. I just had my first day on Friday and it went very well. It's fairly stressful because there's so many issues people have, but I enjoy working with people, so it worked. Also, the pay is very good, especially for a 5 week position. The base salary is $2 higher than the sales job.

2006-07-06T00:05:00.000-04:00

i didn't get the farm job. i'm very disappointed. i remember eddy did a sermon about disappointment for teen campers at the campground from 2 corinthians 4. what'd he say again??

Summer Job

2006-07-04T10:18:00.000-04:00

I understand that people are jealous of teachers. In some regards, they have every right. We get off work at 3pm, we have several vacation weeks throughout the year, and then the real kicker, we get 10 weeks off during the summer months. It's a sweet gig and I can't complain. On the other hand, people have every right to pity us. We (new teachers, at least) work well over 60 hours a week. Sometimes way over that. Many teachers are quick to point out (and rightly so) that they work as many hours in the nine months as most people work in a whole year. And the truth is that most teachers that are worth their hire are also working in the summer 10 weeks, either another job or on curriculum or research for the upcoming school year. Oh yeah, and teachers get paid crap.

I'm looking for a summer job and have not had tons of luck so far. I had two jobs in my back pocket for a while, but have had to turn them both down. One was working for a local mortgage company in sales. The pay could have been ridiculously good, but I really didn't feel comfortable getting into that again. Not that I think all sales jobs are evil (you heard me, Shawn), but in that particular environment I would have had trouble working hard and "unto the Lord." I also had to turn down a painting job because we only have one car and the job site was 45 minutes away.

My most recent hope came yesterday when I visited a local farm called "Smith Farm." Farm work is really what I've been wanting to do for several years now, so I really hope that it happens. And $10 an hour is a lot more than I would have assumed I could have gotten for farm work...

I'll keep you all updated.

Tampa 2006!

2006-07-02T17:35:00.000-04:00

Now and again I'll meet up with a friend or an acquaintance who I haven't seen in a long while. Whenever that happens, I feel at a complete loss to "catch up" with them. How can you catch someone up on years (or really even months) of your life? That's a little bit how I feel about catching anyone up on our gettogether in Tampa. There's just too much that happened. Too many conversations, too many good meals, too many prayers, too many tears, too many laughs. I'm not a good enough writer to do it justice.

To all of you who were able to make it, thank you. Thank you for one of the most enjoyable weeks of my life. To those of you who couldn't make it, New England 2007!!

2006-06-21T17:40:00.000-04:00

2006-06-20T16:06:00.000-04:00

That time has come. My head has been shaved.

2006-06-19T20:01:00.000-04:00

This is my weirdo brother-in-law on the right. And cousin-in-law on the left. They are gay.

Boston trip with Phil

2006-06-18T12:51:00.000-04:00

This is me right before I left for the trip. I'm very excited to spend the weekend with Phil.

Phil loves everything and everyone. P.S. That's Bassett and Mandy.

Phil is happy. Bassett is handicapped. Mandy is drunk.
There we are at "Ned Devine's." It only took us about 45 minutes to get our table there. I promise you that they have the world's worst hostess.

2006-06-18T12:48:00.000-04:00

This is Phil on the computer whoring himself out to his beloved corporation.

I put this picture out of order. This is the incredible Clam Chowder that I had at Ned Devine's. It won some "Best Chowder" award in 2004 and 2005. Although we all agreed that they made up the contest.

This is our view from outside the hotel. Thanks to Phil, that's the nicest hotel I'll ever stay in.

2006-06-18T12:40:00.000-04:00

Smokers go to hell. It's really a logical next step.

This is where Phil and I had some half-way decent pizza on our way to Boston Commons. Some of you may remember that as the place we played frisbee at my bachelor party.
I believe Phil is whistling "We are the Champions."

This is at a very famous graveyard (also on the way to the Commons). All of the men murdered in the Boston Massacre (which is sort of a misnomer since only about 4 people died) were buried here as well as Paul Revere. This guy was a tour guide of sorts explaining all of the historical inaccuracies of Longfellow's "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere." Phil is terribly impressed.

2006-06-18T12:38:00.000-04:00

We watched a sweet little league game once we got to the Commons. Strangely enough, this was the second little league game we've watched together in our lifetimes. It was the Cardinals vs. the Tigers. Intense.

The view of the Harbor right outside the hotel.

This is where Phil and I read Eddy's post on the forum about all of us somewhat moving on from one another. It was nice that we were together when we read that.

2006-06-16T10:42:00.000-04:00

"Today is the greatest day I've ever known."
- Me, on the last day of school

Community in 17 Sensible Steps by Wendell Berry

2006-06-12T11:16:00.000-04:00

-I think there's a natural tendency we have to preach to the choir. The choir is much more sympathetic. Sometimes I doubt the sincerity of people when they listen to someone with the exact same views as them and then say, "Wow, that was really convicting. I really needed that." Maybe they're being honest, but usually those statements are reserved for when someone tells you something you really are not comfortable hearing. So I'd like to assure you of my sincerity when I tell you that the following list written by a guy I tend to agree with was very convicting. If I agree with this stuff, why won't I act on it? My comments are included here, but should not be compared with the prose of Mr. Berry.-

"How can a sustainable local community (which is to say a sustainable localeconomy) function? I am going to suggest a set of rules that I think such acommunity would have to follow. I hasten to say that I do not understandthese rules as predictions; I am not interested in foretelling the future.If these rules have any validity, it is because they apply now.Supposing that the members of a local community wanted their community tocohere, to flourish, and to last, they would:

1. Ask of any proposed change or innovation: What will this do to ourcommunity? How will this affect our common wealth?

2. Include local nature - the land, the water, the air, the native creatures- within the community.

3. Ask how local needs might be supported from local sources, including the mutual help of neighbors.

-I've had the desire for a long time now to make the overwhelming majority of my purchases from local businesses and farms. Tiffany and I do that, to an extent, but I especially haven't been proactive enough in terms of food. We buy all of our food from Shaw's and none of it from local farms.-

4. Supply local needs first (and only then think of exporting theirproducts, first to nearby cities, and then to others).

5. Understand the ultimate unsoundness of the industrial doctrine of "laborsaving" if that implies poor work, unemployment, or any kind of pollution or contamination.

6. Develop properly scaled value-adding industries for local products in order not to become merely a colony of the national or global economy.

-What does this mean? What kinds of industries would that be? And how would we develop them?-

7. Develop small-scale industries and businesses to support the local farmor forest economy.

8. Strive to produce as much of their own energy as possible.

-I don't produce anything. Absolutely nothing. I don't grow anything. I don't make anything.-

9. Strive to increase earnings (in whatever form) within the community, and decrease expenditures outside the community.

10. Circulate money within the local economy as long as possible before paying it out.

-I would say that 99% of the things I purchase ship money out of our local economy. How does this affect my decision even to purchase books from Amazon.com? In that instance, I feel somewhat justified because we don't really have a local bookstore. Maybe opening my own local bookstore would be a start?-

11. Invest in the community to maintain its properties, keep it clean (without dirtying some other place), care for its old people, and teach its children.

12. Arrange for the young and the old to take care of one another, eliminating institutionalized "child care" and "homes for the aged." The young must learn from the old, not necessarily and not always in school; the community knows and remembers itself by the association of old and young.

13. Account for costs that are now conventionally hidden or "externalized." Whenever possible they must be debited against monetary income.

14. Look into the possible uses of local currency, community-funded loan programs, systems of barter and the like.

-Where would I go to look into this?-

15. Be aware of the economic value of neighborliness - as help, insurance, and so on. They must realize that in our time the costs of living are greatly increased by the loss of neighborhood, leaving people to face their calamities alone.

16. Be acquainted with, and complexly connected with, community-minded people in nearby towns and cities.

17. Cultivate urban consumers loyal to local products to build a sustainable rural community, which will always be more cooperative than competitive."

-Wow. What would a "cooperative" economy look like? Competition is how we've been taught to think of economics.-

>From a speech delivered November 11, 1994, at the 23rd annual meeting of theNorthern Plains Resource Council.