Monthly Archives: September 2005

Girls of the Gap

Playboy is looking for more women to be turned into cheap eye-candy. I’m pretty certain that someone at the Gap is willing to throw of their inhibitions, and clothes, and be photographed so that guys can look at them naked, and then once they’ve seen that, a few will see them in person (while hopefully they’re wearing some clothes) and then harras and hound them so as to make them feel awkward. Ahh, but getting a discount on jeans is not enough for some people, they want to show off what their mom and dad gave them so that their mom and dad can be utterly embarrassed. Yeah, that’ll be good for all sorts of morale at the threads retailer… “Why buy our clothes, obviously our employees aren’t wearing them.” You’re fired.

Ascending Mount Grays

Grays and Torreys Labeled
Last week I wrote about hiking up to the peaks of Mount Grays and Torreys. I didn’t make Torreys peak. About 100 yards/meters from the peak I got a leg cramp. The down side of this was that I knew my legs had just about had it. The up side was that it was approximately 32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 degrees Celcius) – I couldn’t feel my leg well enough for it to hurt (I was wearing shorts). I stretched out my calf and then finished the hike to the top. I met my party at the top and then told them that I was heading back down. It was really windy and cold at the peak so I cut out and headed back down to the car. I figured I might have to wait an extra hour or so before they got back given that I was leaving early.

My right knee started to hurt and so I found myself walking slowly. About 2/3 of the way down I turned around to see Laban running down towards me. I immediately realized something was wrong because you don’t run down a 14,000 foot mountain. Of course I was the one that was wrong, he, Brian and Jim had run down from the top because, “It was easier than walking.” Color me a wimp buy I didn’t have the stamina or the leg for continued running so they all walked with me limping along to keep up with their well honed bodies.

It was lots of fun and I’ve uploaded some pictures of the trip to my Flickr account. Enjoy 🙂

Everybody’s Doing It

I’ll be attempting to hike up Mounts Grays and Torreys tomorrow. I’m really looking forward to the exercise, but I’m also looking forward to the fellowship. Hiking up is slow and has little talking but the downward hike is faster and because you’re gaining oxygen you really are able to feel better and talk more.

This will officially be the highest I’ve ever been while walking on terra firma. I’ll have to see what can be done to go to Mt. Elbert some time in the future since it is several hundred feet taller. I’m planning on bringing some food, water, a camera, a tripod and a change of clothes in case we run into bigfoot. Apparently there will be lots of people there because these are the two easiest mountains and there is just a saddleback between them.

Maybe Mount Whitney when I turn 30 🙂

Me, Richard Simmons and the Raelians

Richard Simmons, being a brilliant think tank all in one man, being able to personally contribute to the weight loss of more people throughout more decades than the originator of any eating disorder, said the following brilliant quote last night: “New Orleans is the Venice, Italy of the world.” [cite]
Brilliant. There’s no other word for it.

My buddy Trint asked, “Oh good grief. When is Richard Simmons going to die?” And that’s when it hit me: he’s not going to. He’s the first Raelian clone. He will forever be dancing to the oldies, even when they’re the oldies of Brian Wilson, 50 Cent and Coldplay. Indy bands that are yet to be signed to major labels or have their tracks given away on iTunes will be danced to before this man stops being cloned. Bipeds will be talking about the ancient instruments called ‘Guitars’ and he’ll be slapping people in airports, dealing meals and swooshing his afro about as he kicks, spins and clones himself into oblivian. Richard Simmons is a clone.

I, however, am avoiding being cloned. What? With my zany sense of humor, crazy/obscure jokes and off the wall one liners I’d probably throw the universe out of alignment and we’d all go crashing into the sun. Then we’d really be sweating to the oldies 😉

thanks to Robin for turning me on to the Richy Simmy quote.

Holy Freaking Cow: iPod Nano

With a color display that is 1.5 inches (3.81 centimeters) wide the new iPod Nano is amazing. It can store 2 or 4 giggabytes of data [depending on the model you choose]. It also replaces the sexy iPod Minis. Therefore you can probably go out and buy a mini for less (less mini?) than $199.00 now, the refurb store on Apple’s site is showing them currently at $179.00. You can also store and view images on the nano, which rocks, well, actually, the music rocks, the images viewing is handy for people who like thumbnails. Jessica even wants one, which made me chuckle 🙂

Christian Foundations Study

Tonight is the first Study in the new Christian Foundations Study we’re doing in Aurora. Its also the first adult Bible Study I’ve lead, so I’m a wee nervous. Not because I think I’ll fail but mostly because I’m used to questions that High Schoolers or Junior Highers/Middle Schoolers ask. I want this to be a great foundation study that will allow new/young believers to grow on. I’ve been a Christian since I was about 4 (I don’t know the exact date I asked Christ to be my savior – I don’t think I knew what a date was back then 🙂 ), but I’ve only grown as much as I have since I was about 20. Prior to that I was a a Christian without direction or understanding. I had been discipled some and had grown some but I had not been equipped. Having the understanding to start growing through your own personal study made things handy. What is amazing is how many times you get told ‘Read the Bible.’ when you really have no idea how to read the Bible and understand it. Not that the Bible is not understandable but that its an immense book with lots of styles of writing and topics in it.

You need to know how to identify various things that are historical, understand thte timeline of events so that you’re not just reading anything and trying to apply it to yourself. These are all things I hope to cover in the study, and I hope that those who attend find it fulfilling since I’m going to be pouring myself into it as best as possible.

Request for Clarification: Define Radical Right Wing Agenda

I was just on a website that had the term ‘Radical Right Wing Agenda’ as something they were fighting against. I consider myself conservative, but I don’t feel radical, I don’t lump myself into ‘right wing’ and I don’t feel like I’ve got an agenda [politically speaking]. However, I know that there are people out there that are matching the said title. I don’t know what that title references though, so if you feel like you’ve got a clear definition of this term, please leave it in the comments. I just want to understand if this is an actually small group like the people who put up godhatesfags.com, or are they referring to anyone conservatively oriented in general. The problem with these sorts of generalizations is that they require people to ask deeper questions to try to understand.

In my history classes we would use the term ‘platform’ to describe the agenda that a certain historical politician had. Is having an agenda bad? I don’t think so. Clearly the people whose site I was reading had an agenda, they were against something and wanted to stop that something from being propogated. I think that the talking heads, political analysts and radio show hosts need to be very, very careful when they speak of ‘agendas’ and various other ‘lumping’ terms that reduce people from being people to statistics, ‘us verses them’ or any other thing besides United States (or other country) citizens who hold beliefs that they, by United States Constitutional standards, have a God given right to hold.

So, with that in mind: what’s the definition, and is it a fair definition?