Friday Five! Bah Humbug

Parishioners pushing for carols before you digested your turkey?

Organist refusing to play Advent hymns because he/she already has them planned for Lessons & Carols?

Find yourself reading Luke and thinking of a variety of ways to tell Linus where to stick it? (Lights please.)

Then this quick and easy Friday Five is for you! And for those of you with a more positive attitude, have no fear. I am sure more sacred and reverent Friday Fives will follow.

Please tell us your least favorite/most annoying seasonal....

1) dessert/cookie/family food... First is Fruit Cake, my Dad loves the stuff. Next is anything my uncle's second wife cooks

2) beverage (seasonal beer, eggnog w/ way too much egg and not enough nog, etc...) The home brewed beer my uncle gives us ( yes the same uncle with the wife that can't cook)

3) tradition (church, family, other) the staircase picture with my cousins at said uncle's house

4) decoration those blow up lawn ornaments especially when there are 250 on one lawn

5) gift (received or given) received fondue sets and yes it is sets plural because we got them several years in a row ( guess which person gives us that every year!)

BONUS: SONG/CD that makes you want to tell the elves where to stick it. Johnny Mathis not because he is a bad singer but because my mom plays it over and over again! Also, several songs were ruined for me because my favorite uncle used to force the cousins to sing them

I know, I know.... pretty grumpy for November but why not get it out of our systems now so we are free to enjoy the rest of the festivities.

Found this interesting

I found this interesting.. I found this at cheesehead's and she found it elsewhere:

As found at Mary Beth's place. Here is a game developed by Jeanne of Social Class and Quakers, based on the copyrighted exercise developed by Will Barratt, Meagan Cahill, Angie Carlen, Minnette Huck, Drew Lurker, Stacy Ploskonka at Illinois State University.

If you play and post, please acknowledge their copyright.

Bold items are privileges I have had. Italics are mine.

Father went to college
Father finished college
Mother went to college
Mother finished college
Have any relative who is an attorney, physician, or professor.
Were the same or higher class than your high school teachers
Had more than 50 books in your childhood home
Had more than 500 books in your childhood home
Were read children's books by a parent
Had lessons of any kind before you turned 18
Had more than two kinds of lessons before you turned 18
The people in the media who dress and talk like me are portrayed positively
Had a credit card with your name on it before you turned 18
Your parents (or a trust) paid for all of your college costs
Went to a private high school
Went to summer camp (sports and church camps)
Had a private tutor before you turned 18
Family vacations involved staying at hotels
Your clothing was all bought new before you turned 18
Your parents bought you a car that was not a hand-me-down from them
There was original art in your house when you were a child it was done by family friends
Had a phone in your room before you turned 18
You and your family lived in a single family house
Your parent(s) owned their own house or apartment before you left home
You had your own room as a child
Participated in an SAT/ACT prep course
Had your own TV in your room in High School
Owned a mutual fund or IRA in High School or College
Flew anywhere on a commercial airline before you turned 16
Went on a cruise with your family
Went on more than one cruise with your family
Your parents took you to museums and art galleries as you grew up
You were unaware of how much heating bills were for your family

Certified!!!!

I am a certified candidate for ordained ministry in the United Methodist church ( well provisionally assuming my psych eval is ok and nothing comes up in my back ground check. I am super excited. I wasn't to nervous going in. Only a little bit. I feel like I answered the question honestly and with integrity. I think one of the members is less than thrilled with. This one person basically asked me if you have to be part of a church to follow Jesus .. my answer in a nut shell NO. Yes I think Church helps in many ways, but is not a requirement. I mean aren't we supposed to be promoting and encouraging faith spirituality and a relationship with God and not just the church?

But I still passed my DCOM .....One more step down about a million to go.....



HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE

Bullet Style

Life has been crazy so here it is...

• I am grateful for my friends
  
• I am missing my college friends big time
• There is only two weeks left in the semester... where did the time go
• This week I go before my DCOM to become a certified candidate
• The field Hockey team that I have been helping coach lost in the state semifinals. They had a great season and were a fun bunch to coach
• I have never laughed so much in one weekend
  
• You need a lot of laughter to spend three days with 21 teenage girls
• Death is never easy unexpected death at a young age even harder
• Just when i think i have one particular situation under control it blows up again
• I live in dualities
• The church I serve always surprises in both good and bad
• We need change I'm just not sure how to get it...

Sorry that some of these are cryptic but that is how it has to be

Perspective

I am watching 20/20 right now and Diane Sawyer is doing a follow up to her story on Camden, NJ . It really puts things in perspective. When you hear a 13 year old say they have never had a best day in his life, that is sad. When you see a kid who really wants to be in school, knows that his only ticket out of poverty is an education and they are willing to do whatever they need to get it. You realize how much they take for granted. You realize exactly how selfish we are and how much we live in a bubble. I just can't express right now the desperation and in honesty guilt I feel.

Hello anyone home?

That maybe the question you are asking yourself about this blog. I have not been blogging with any type of regularity this semester. There are multiple reasons for that. First, school is kicking my butt this semester. Not so much in terms of work but in terms of being mentally draining. Even then it is not the I am learning so much I don;t know what to do with myself sense. Instead in more of the I am in class I should be learning something right? sense. Not that all my classes are bad. They just aren't as stimulating and exciting as the were last year. Therefor they do not lend themselves to be blogged about.

The other reason why I have not blogged as much is because dumb boy is still in my head and sometimes i get kind of sad about that . Which then makes me angry at myself because I know that i should not be wasting any more of my time.

Luckily yesterday there were some things worth blogging about. My mentor is working on her DMin and came to school the last two days to interview some of us about our ideas about the post modern church for a project for one of her classes. It was kind of weird for me answering the questions because she knew a lot of my answers. However, it was good for me to say them out loud in a more formal setting. There is potential that the video of our interviews will be shown to my Board of Ordained Ministry and she asked if I was comfortable with that. I did not say anything too awful about the current church but I was clear in the fact that the status quo was not working and I think church hierarchy and bureaucracy are part of the reason for that. So my answer to her was yes show it to who ever you want, because I am who I am and there is room for me to change and grow however, I don't think that these views are going to change that much except for maybe get a little stronger.

Second bloggable topic that is not related to ministry or school is local elections. Ever since I was a little kid I have like politics. In high school I used regular attend city council meetings and I attended charter review meeting (my city's governing document) and even added the the changes in the charter ( I even got to write the section myself). Well yesterday was election day in my home town. There is a very clear very deep "good old boys" network in my town. that for a long time has been very powerful and in the 5-7 years has done quite a bit of damage with the decisions they have made in regard to city government and to building (my town has become high rise central with luxury apartments, condos, multi-million dollar homes.. green space what is green space???). The last two years however we have had a great female mayor who has done a lot of work in a short amount of time to change the thinking of what Saratoga should look like and taking a step back from the local issues and really listening to what the community needs. Well she was the incumbent and was viciously attacked my her opponents. She was even challenged by her own party because she actually listened to the people and some times that meant not doing what the party expected her to do. These attacks were really vicious and sad. Unfortunately despite her best efforts she lost a fairly close election.Which is really sad to me. Here was a women who was willing to take on the old guard to make things better for everyone. I did not always agree with her, but she really did seem to work for the people. Sadly, I think our new mayor will be working for the developers and contractor of the city and those who will be willing to contribute to his next campaign. I have a feeling thing are going to get much worse in my hometown before they get better....