Patterns in the Randomness

Convert Blocks of Text To One LIne

2009-06-04T18:23:00.003-06:00

I created this to help with posting javascript into a blog. It seems you have to convert everything to one line in the blogger html editor for this stuff to work.

2009-05-25T18:52:00.074-06:00

Crown Update

2009-02-17T09:29:00.003-06:00

It's been a while since I posted here in this blog. I've been putting most of my posts on facebook in the form of notes. At any rate, I thought it would be good to post a Crown Update.

A Crown group just finished up early December 2008. This group was the 4th group to participate in the study since my wife and I began facilitating Crown in our current church. This was supposed to be the first group without direct participation from either me or my wife; however, one of us ended up attending 1/2 of the meetings.

About 10 or 12 people participated in the study. The leaders who ran the group started Crown with us a year earlier, as well as the co leaders. One couple (from this group) has volunteered with out us asking, to lead the next group. This is exciting for me, as it looks like the study is going to take root in that church.

During one of the studies, a very educated woman pointed out on a side note how Capitalism had failed as evidenced by the economic crisis in the United States. Oh man, how I bit my tongue! But I did quickly point out, that it was not Capitalism that failed but a form of Socialism that is failing the people of the US right now. I did not go into a lot of detail at that time as I thought it was out of place for the study.

After the study, I found 2 kindred spirits. It turns out that the co leaders of this group own their own store and hate socialism as much as I do. I found that very interesting.

As I mentioned, during the study, we did not debate politics or economic systems but kept the study on track. Its more important to study God's word, apply it and then be set free. That's the purpose of the Crown study.

2008-10-10T15:51:00.002-06:00

Not all change is good change.

What do you trust?

2008-09-09T14:48:00.002-06:00

Where is your hope?

Many people trust different things many of which are tangible or intangible. Some folks trust in their abilities and in their track record of getting stuff done. Others trust in the cash or assets they have.

The Christian and Muslim trust that there is a God, the atheist trusts that there is not one.

Some trust in their doctrine or theology, trusting in their vast knowledge of Biblical texts.

But when you’re down and all you can see is absolute chaos, what are you trusting in; where is your hope?

Your SUV and George Bush are destroying Mars!

2008-07-17T13:24:00.002-06:00

I just read a fascinating article about similarities between Alaska and Mars.

Click her for source article.

A pair of scientist, noticed that some formations in a Martian photo were similar to some in an Alaskan photo. They set out to find what caused the pattern in the Alaskan photo. They determined that it was avalanches. A side note in the article said that they speculated that these avalanches were being caused by climate change.

They sent their results to NASA. Sometime later, NASA was able to get a picture of a real life avalanche happening on Mars. Pretty cool. The avalanche was being cause by ice breaking up.

I suppose this avalanche also was being caused by climate change on Mars. Everybody knows that global warming and climate change is happening because of your SUV and George Bush. I just did not know that the problem was as bad as it is! So bad that we are affecting the climate on Mars! Quick! Somebody needs to alert Al Gore and the United Nations!

Airing Laundry In Public

2008-07-10T10:39:00.005-06:00

Disclaimer: This post lacks much tact and borderlines, if not crosses the boundary into pure gossip. In fact, this post is very immature. I believe that every man has an adolescent living in him; perhaps that's why I'm posting this.

Background: My neighborhood is somewhat uppity. Maybe a better word is wannabe uppity. Or even better description would be, others think that we're uppity. Yeah, that's really how it is. We're just regular folk - like the name of this blog. By US standards, my house and the other houses here are kind of regular, somewhat humble. (What we do have better than US houses is that our houses are made of 100% concrete - which rocks!) Our houses are just much smaller than US middle class houses.

The neighborhood behind ours sits somewhere between ours and zero on the "neighborhood class" spectrum; so the folks from there have hinted to me. I've heard people specifically make distinctions between my neighborhood and the one behind ours (and most of those folks happen to be from the neighborhood behind ours). The funny thing is, if you get on my roof, you see that it really looks like one neighborhood - us with them as one. In fact, the back wall of my house touches the back wall of the house in the neighborhood behind mine.

The Story: A new family moved into the neighborhood. Great! New neighbors! So I try to be friendly, maybe too friendly. I'm careful to always say hi and talk with them, engage in small talk - you know the general kind of stuff to make people feel welcomed. Then one day, to everyone's dismay the Mrs of this family started doing this to the vacant lot in front of her house:

WHAT THE HECK !!!!????
This, actually is a more pleasant photo. At times we can see clothes that you really shouldn't just do stuff like this with. So, my wife and I talked about this for 2 or 3 weeks. I told her, that I would politely speak with this lady to get her to stop this practice. But every time, I tried to bring the subject up, I just chickened out. Finally after having enough, my wife politely brought the subject up with her. I was not present, but she assured me that she chose her words carefully and tried to be as polite as possible. The translation of a cut of what transpired is that my wife mentioned to her that it was somewhat ugly and we should do all that we could do to keep the neighborhood looking nice. This lady responded that her daughter also said that it was ugly and that she shouldn't do it. So great, my wife is on the same page with this lady's daughter. (It's also worth mentioning that the word "ugly" in this case might be better translated as "not so nice".)

That evening, I was playing soccer with my kids in the street. This lady left her house probably to get something from the grocery store around the corner. I waved, but she was obviously very bothered and ignored me. When she got back, she called me over. Her story and the story that my wife had of their conversation were very very different. Amazing. In her story, my wife used very strong words and was very belittling of her.

So what to do? I assured her of our genuine aspirations to maintain peace with her and her family and at the same time I firmly sided with my wife's stance of keeping the neighborhood looking nice as well as questioning whether she used "feo" or "HOR-I-BLE!!!" ("ugly" or "HORRIBLE!!!").

Lesson Learned: For me, this was a very eye opening culture experience. This lady would've rather that we gossiped about her behind back, even going as far as posting this on the internet than have us confront her face-to-face to complain about an issue that we had with her. I'm over 35 years old and I never quit learning. This one experience helped shed light on a lot of things for me of which I will not get into here.

So, what happened? Well, she keeps putting her clothes out there on the fence of that vacant lot. Not that much now, but in defiance she still does it.

As for me, the adolescent in me thinks its kind of funny and does not run out of ideas of what to do about this. Unfortunately, I haven't acted out on any of those childish prank ideas that he keeps coming up with, yet. I think its the mature adult in me that's keeping that adolescent in check. But, wait! I didn't tell you, that there's an old man in me who's in his late 60s who agrees with that adolescent; so its hard to say how this is going to play out.

I know everybody hates those neighborhood associations micromanaging people and lording power over folks; but we sure could use one here!

You are responsible for yourself

2008-07-09T16:22:00.005-06:00

Breaking News from Drudge:

There's some infighting going on, on the Democrat side. Big deal. That's just how it is on any side.

Jesse Jackson said something stupid concerning Obama that was meant for private but got public.

Here's a clip of what bothered me the most about what he said (copied straight from drudgereport.com):

_My appeal was for the moral content of his message to not only deal with the personal and moral responsibility of black males, but to deal with the collective moral responsibility of government and the public policy which would be a corrective action for the lack of good choices that often led to their irresponsibility.

This statement exposes the heart of the problem with Democrats. What bothers me about his statement is his point of view. He's implying that poor decisions with the government led to folks being irresponsible. That's probably the key problem with the Democratic party: They look to government to take care of them instead of them taking care of themselves.

I can rephrase this statement: Democrats believe with absolute conviction that the government must take care of the people.

Let me go one step farther: so much so, the government must take care of the people at the expense of other people.

When the government doesn't "take care of someone" that someone has an excuse to be irresponsible.

Lets exam this premise, there are all kinds of problems with Democrat thinking.

1. They don't believe in individual responsibility but they believe that the government must take care of individuals.
2. If someone has it together and is responsible, the Democrats want to punish that person by taking away the fruits of his labor and give them to someone else who is irresponsible.

Why can they not see that this is truly absurd, backwards thinking?

Some folks mistakenly think that Democrats help people. Democrats don't help anybody. They enslave people with their socialist programs; extinguishing any flame of ambition that their new found slaves once had. While doing this, they are robbing from producers in our society, likewise throwing water on this metaphorical flame of ambition.

My advice to Jesse Jackson, Obama and other Democrats is to stop looking to government for the solutions to your problems. Doing so, only encourages government to try to solve your problems, which in the long run creates even BIGGER problems for everybody.

Boldness and Conviction

2008-07-03T16:05:00.004-06:00

What would the men who signed their names to the document below have to say about things now? Nonetheless, the Declaration of Independence is one of the most beautiful and powerful works of all history. It takes serious boldness and conviction to send something like this to your authority.

The Declaration of Independence

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor. The signers of the Declaration represented the new states as follows: New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton Massachusetts: John Hancock, Samual Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott New York: William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris New Jersey: Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross Delaware: Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

Can God Be Impressed?

2008-07-03T15:41:00.002-06:00

Is it possible for the Almighty to be impressed by anything let alone anyone?

When Stephen was martyred, one gets the impression that God was impressed, as Jesus was standing.

When Jesus met the Canaanite woman, he seemed impressed with her faith.

Kick His @$$

2008-07-02T13:09:00.003-06:00

A 14 year old thought that it was funny pushing somebody's grandpa off a dock.

Click here for the source article.

Yeah sure, he's a juvenile. I don't care. The punishment should fit the crime.

If you were a state legislator, what kind of punishment would you come up with for something like this?

If I were a state legislator.......the punishment would be:

public @ss beating of some form
Fine of $2500 to $15000 to be given to the victim.
6 months to 1 year hard juvenile boot camp

And, if I were a by stander.......

Transformer Politics

2008-06-20T07:08:00.005-06:00

Is it just me? Does anyone else see the similarities? Maybe its because I grew up in the 80s and at the same time I'm very political.

Here's what I'm talking about:

Obama is really kind of like a Star Scream, and Bill Clinton would probably be a better fit for Megatron. But, Obamatron sounds better than Clintontron. One could also make the argument that Hillary Clinton is more like a Star Scream and Obama the Megatron. Anyway, Obamatron sounds better than Clintontron; and Obama clinched it for his party. Therefore, he is: Obamatron!

Now McCain being a RINObot makes complete sense. The Dinobot, Grimlock was constantly testing Optimus Prime's authority. Now here are the parallels: McCain is not a true fiscal or social conservative and has tested the 'authority' of the Republican Party in the past; or at least severely tested the folks in the Republican base. Also, the Dinobots are in the form of Dinosaurs. Many keep bringing McCain's age into the equation..... And finally, Dino rhymes really well with RINO. For those of you who don't know the right wing jargon, RINO = "Republican In Name Only", hence a moderate or a liberal calling himself a Republican.

And Optimus Prime, who is he? He would either be Ronald Reagan, the "spirit" of Ronald Reagan, the general consensus of true US-Capitalistic-Social Conservatism the essence of the US Constitution. Optimus Prime is the good guy in the story who is the real fighter for Liberty.

As for Obamatron, I'm not through with him yet. Megatron is a Decepticon. Obama is a Democrat. Obamatron then is a Deceptocrat. Notice "Decept" for Deception. In the recent Transformer movie, the Decepticon Police Car had written on it the motto: "To Punish and Enslave" as opposed to "To Protect and to Serve". I liked the parallel of the authority image of the police car. The same for Obama, he wishes to be our authority, supposedly to serve us; but in reality to enslave us with more socialism. Currently the average family works from January to May just for uncle sam. With Obamatron in office, will we work from January until July?

And Grimlock, I mean McCain, I mean the RINObot, what about him? Our founding fathers gave us a Constitutional Republic with the idea of keeping us free men. Since the beginning of our country, there have been few presidents who have run with the torch of Liberty. Reagan was the last one so far. Bush tried to cloak himself in the Constitution, but as many can see, he has a lot of RINObot tendencies.

McCain is completely a RINObot:
challenging US Constitutional principles
and
Obama is Obamatron completely fighting US Constitutional principles.

One, a thorn in the flesh
of "Constitutionist Prime"
the other
an enemy
of "Constitutionist Prime"

The Police State

2008-05-25T07:58:00.003-06:00

So, it looks like someone in Colorado called in a prank phone call to 911 in Texas. The state of Texas then proceeds to abduct over 400 children from families of some religious group that most of us might consider odd.

I've been wanting to write about this ever since it happened. Shame on us for not going to Texas and standing beside those people! If there is abuse going on, then the state needs to handle this on a case by case basis.

Thank God that the court is acting properly in this, as it has ruled that the kids must be returned. Hopefully those kids will get returned to their families soon.

Transformer Politics

2008-05-12T14:58:00.005-06:00

Where is Constitutionist Prime?

What do you mean, that a Rinobot is leading the charge against Obamatron and the Deceptocrats?!

Crown Update

2008-05-10T08:29:00.002-06:00

Last Sunday, we had a Crown graduation at the church. This is the 3rd group that we've lead since being here. (We each led 1 group at the same time in September to November 2008).

This time around 4 folks graduated and 2 co-leaders completed their 2nd run of this; making them now ready to lead their own group.

One lady did not graduate because she missed 1 too many classes. I really felt bad for her. It seems that she has a lot of pressure on her, with her mother, husband and kids all competing for her attention. I am hoping that she participates again in the future.

77 Years Ago and Approximately 25 Percent of My Collective DNA

2008-05-07T10:07:00.015-06:00

The man behind the check out counter is my great-grandfather (Moritz). This is a picture of the grocery store that he owned and started in Atlanta. The lady in the background at the meat counter is his wife and my great-grand mother (Clara).

My great-grand father was born in Texas sometime in the 1890s. He grew up on a ranch herding cattle and sheep. His grandfather (Richard) migrated from Germany to Texas with 4 or 5 brothers in the early 1840s.

Moritz met his wife in Clara during World War I. He served in the US Navy and spent time on a destroyer in the South Pacific as a cook and a boxer. My great-grandmother was from Decatur, Georgia.

From what I've been told, they married and tried to settle down on a ranch in Texas. Clara did not like the solitude life on the ranch, so they picked up and moved to Decatur. To make money, Moritz fell back on what he knew cooking and butchering. He started some kind of food delivery service that eventually grew into a butcher shop and ultimately a Gourmet Grocery Store on Peachtree Street in downtown Atlanta. That store finally closed in the late 1970s.

The two pictures are of a predecessor store to his final and ultimate store which was on Peachtree Street.

My grandfather told me that these pictures were taken 77 years ago; therefore I'm guessing that the year was 1931.

Inserted Addendum
Great grandchildren most likey carry 12.5% DNA of one of their great grandparents. I say most likely because genetics are very random and could cause the number to be more or less, but its probably close to 12.5 %. Think about it, most people have 8 distinct great grandparents.

100% / 8 = 12.5%

In this picture are two of my great-grandparents.

12.5% + 12.5% = 25%

(continue with original post....)

One quick story about my great-grandfather:
He was on an overnight hunting trip with my granddad and some other guys. My granddad was a kid at the time. A preacher was at the campsite hanging out with them. Apparently this preacher had a brother who was also a preacher and involved in some kind of scandal with some woman at a hotel. The story goes that the preacher was telling them what happened and was defending his brother at the same time. The preacher's account is that his brother was at a hotel at some convention or something when he received a knock on his door from some desolate woman. He did not want to turn her away, so felling sorry for her, he allowed her to come into his room. The woman quickly began to make advances toward this fellow. She sat on the end of his bed, then she moved closer, etc.... I cannot remember, how the story of this fellow ended but in the end supposedly nothing happened and he was able to fight her off.

Now word was on the street, that this preacher had hooked up with some strange woman in a hotel in another city at that convention. And his brother was trying to squash the gossip with their version of the story.

Upon hearing the account, Moritz responded; saying that he would've done exactly as the preacher in the hotel room had done.

The preacher telling the story was glad to see that someone was seeing it his way.

After a brief pause, my great-grand father followed with, "But....... I wouldn't have lied about it."

The Woes of Traveling Between 2 Countries

2008-04-29T11:06:00.006-06:00

It seems that half the time we are traveling (between the US and Costa Rica) we have some kind of international-travel-technicality mishap with one of our family members. Six weeks or so after my daughter was born in Costa Rica, the authorities would not let her leave the country because they did not have official permission from me to let her travel. The problem was, I was back in Georgia waiting for her! Nevertheless, that problem was resolved within 24 hours after a lot of phone calls and hanging out the next morning at the Costa Rica Consulate office in Marietta. The Consulate there was extremely helpful!

We were bit with that same problem again on a visit 6 months later in December of 2005. They said that the permission we provided last time was not permanent and we had to file another one. Fortunately, we had that taken care of within an hour or so and were able to fly.

On our recent return trip to Costa Rica, December 2007, in Atlanta, we were told that we had to purchase tickets right then to return to the US within the next 3 months or they would not let us fly. Well, me and the kids were told, my wife having her CR passport did not have to. Why did we have to buy return tickets? Because you can only stay in Costa Rica for 3 months at a time if you are not a citizen or resident. The kids and I had that taken care of, but we were not traveling with proof. In fact, the girl was even a citizen of Costa Rica, but the counter agent would not recognize that her birth place according to her US passport was indeed San Jose, Costa Rica. How did we get around this problem. We bought 3 REFUNDABLE tickets to return to Atlanta. That night, once we finally got home, I canceled all 3 of those tickets and got my money back.

Right now, my wife and kids have 2 sets of passports. I have an official Costa Rican Permanent Residence card. You would think that we would be ok. Well, I think that we're ok; but my wife doesn't think so.

Here's the deal: In a little more than one week, we are scheduled to fly to Atlanta. We are again scheduled to return at the end of May. My son's US passport expires in June of this year. Apparently there's some kind of rule supposedly where the airlines will not let you travel if your passport is set to expire within 6 months. My wife is pretty worried about this and is pushing the US Embassy to get my son a new passport or something ASAP.

I think though that we could be ok. If we get to the ticket counter and the ticket agent sees that my son's US passport is about to expire - it seems to me, they have to let him return to country indicated on his passport. In late May, when we return home to Costa Rica, we present the Costa Rican passport to the ticket agent - again, it seems to me that the agent has to let him return to the country indicated on his passport - in this case Costa Rica.

What do you think?

Door Mat or Place Mat?

2008-04-23T12:28:00.003-06:00

The kids are always asking for cookies and crackers and the like. They ask for them as "premios". Which is Spanish for "prize". Supposedly they have to do something good for a premio. They usually just ask for a premio and half the time they get it. So in my household, "premio" is really just synonymous for "snack" because they really don't earn it much.

Anyway, yesterday, to my utmost horror, the girl was sitting in the door way between the garage and the entrance of the house eating cheese filled Ritz crackers right off of the door mat where everybody wipes their shoes before entering the house.

What she was doing is a notch or two above licking the side walk in downtown Cartago.

The old me, might've panicked and rinsed her mouth out multiple times with mouth wash. (7 or 8 years ago, I did that to my dog after she ate cat crap.) But nah, not now, no time for that. I just wrote it off as an immune system booster and told her not to do it again.....

Chimeras, Polygamy and the IRS

2008-04-16T10:59:00.009-06:00

Chimera is the name of a mythological beast that is made up of whole parts from a lion, snake and a goat. Scientist use this same name for a complete organism that is made of whole parts that have different DNA; an organism with 2 sets of DNA.

Chimeras are created naturally and in laboratories.

In laboratories scientist have combined for example a goat and a sheep to make a Chimera. This is not a hybrid. There is a difference. One way that a Chimera is made is by fusing two embryos together. A Hybrid is typically created by using a sperm from one species and an egg from another.

With A Hybrid, the offspring has characteristics of both species but usually blended very well together. A Hybrid has one set of DNA.

A Chimera is not very well blended at all. A Chimera contains whole parts or patchy spots of the two DNA sets scattered across its body. A Chimera has 2 distinct sets of DNA.

So far a Chimera sounds kind of Frankensteinish.

In nature, a chimera occurs when 2 embryos inside a mother fuse together for some reason. This is apparently rare but does happen. The result is an individual who has 2 sets of DNA from his parents. This person is his own twin. (It would be interesting to know the percentage of humans who are born as Chimeras.)

A sign that someone might be a Chimera would be patchy skin or asymmetrical sides of the body like one eye a different color than the other.

Reading about this got me wondering: What if my wife or what if one of my kids is a Chimera? I don't think that my wife is, but if she were one, then I would be a polygamist.

I think that my son might be one though. Why do I suspect my son of being a Chimera? Well, he doesn't have scales or anything and he doesn't have hooves. However, one of his eyebrows looks like mine and the other one looks like that of my wife's.

If I do find out that he has 2 sets of DNA:

1. Do I have to obtain another social security number for him?
2. Can I claim another dependent on my income taxes and use another child tax credit?
3. Should I give him another set of names?

Here are 2 articles on the subject of Chimeras:
Short Medical Article on Chimeras (Fraternal Twins sharing blood, etc...)
Long article with a lot of detailed information on Chimeras

New rules for dating

2008-04-11T11:04:00.002-06:00

There are general guide lines or rules one should follow before entering into a serious relationship with one of the opposite sex.

A few of these rules are:

You must be compatible
Its best to have similar political views (this isn't always true, but does help)
Its best if the two families can at least get along.
You should be of the same religion. This really comes into play once you have kids.

It turns out there's a new rule that should be added to the list.

You should both be members of the same gang or compatible gangs.

A fight broke out between a couple recently. A man belonging to a different gang than his girl friend had a violent disagreement with her concerning which gang their 4-year-old should join. Only if they had known about this new relationship rule, all of this could have been avoided. Someone should let Dr. Laura know about this!

See source article here.

UFO in Costa Rica playa Carrillo - Samara

2008-04-05T15:17:00.011-06:00

Ok, I've been up to my eyes in politics for a while. Here's something a lil different. Who knows about UFOs, Roswell and Area 51 and all that? Perhaps UFOs are from some alien race, perhaps they are controlled by demons or maybe they are indeed created and flown by humans from some secrete branch within the US government or another government. A good friend of mine here in Costa Rica swears that he saw one for a good 15 minutes some 25 or 30 years ago on top of Volcano Irazu while working as a guard up there.

I became more intrigued with the subject last summer when a worker for the national telephone company (ICE may God help them) took a picture of a UFO in Ochomogo a few miles from my house when he was getting off work early in the morning. The locals say there have been many sitings in Ochomogo. Around the same time, a tourist from Europe, the US or Canada (I can't remember but I think Europe) was going throw his Costa Rican vacation pictures and noticed a strange object in the sky that he captured with his camera by accident.

Since then, I've been going through my fotos and paying particular attention to the sky. I've got a picture from December of 2005 where there is a white object in the sky. Perhaps it was just a star as I took the picture at dusk. That pic was taken while in Tierra Blanca (a town on the side of Volcano Irazu). I was facing north, toward the summit of the Volcano. From there you cannot see the summit due to the obstruction of a ridge. But over that ridge, in that picture you can see something white. Perhaps it was a star, I don't know?

Last night while reading speeches by Ron Paul, I was also going through my pictures paying special attention to the sky. In this day and age lots of us have an abundance of pictures that just pile up on our cameras and our computers as the price of taking a picture is much cheaper than it was 10 years ago because we don't need to use film.

While going through the pictures of our trip to Carrillo, Guanacaste (Costa Rica) I noticed a smudge in the sky. On closer observation, I see that this smudge has the traditional saucer shape of a flying saucer plus the center dome of the object that most people associate with a UFO. Again, I have no idea what this is. I find it interesting. Most of my friends know me to be somewhat of a joker and at the same time I would wager that most of y'all consider me a very honest guy. All I can say is that with this picture, I have not doctored or done anything and I am not joking around. Perhaps its really a bird or a plane. Who knows? What do you think?

Here are two pics from the series that I took. I was taking a 360 degree shoot from a mountain top 3km from the beach. The object can be seen in the first pic but not in the second. In the first pic, it is to the left of that bushy tree.

Before
UFO is to the left of the bushy tree.

A few moments after
The object cannot be seen. Proof that there's nothing on the camera...
Close up from first pic

Even closer from first pic

2008-03-23T20:33:00.003-06:00

This guy really put into words something that's been bugging me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sZCNlPwG8o

This is a link to a 10 minute video. The 2nd half is what I'm talking about.

Democrats and Communist

2008-03-18T11:48:00.003-06:00

Something is going on in China right now. Tibet, a province on the western end of China is in an uproar. To be honest, I've only half way been following it so I don't know the reason for the rebellion or many details save what I've been skimming in the drudgereport.

However, one thing did catch my attention:

Zhang Qingli, the secretary of the Tibet Autonomous Region has said (reported by www.iht.com):

"The Communist Party is like the parent to the Tibetan people, and it is always considerate about what the children need," Zhang said last year. He later added: "The Central Party Committee is the real Buddha for Tibetans."

Doesn't that make you want to throw up? I'm not Buddhist by any means but 2 things jump out at me from this statement.

1. The Communist party essentially claiming to be their god. Well, there's just not any words for this. Just sick really. This makes me think that communism should be redefined as a cult.

2. The part about the Communist Party is like the parent of the Tibetan people. This now, reminds me of the town hall meeting back in one of the presidential elections in the 90s. Some hippie joker cried out to Bill Clinton saying, "Are we not your children?"

The price of Liberty

2008-03-03T17:35:00.002-06:00

Liberty is a very expensive commodity.

Liberty is bigger than any one person.

Liberty is more important than the operation that someone's grandmother needs for a hip replacement.

Liberty is more important than the liver transplant to keep an 18 year old alive.

Liberty is more important than the food that starving children need to survive.

Our fathers died for us to have Liberty. Why have we been giving it up over the past 80 years or so?

Let's Strengthen the Electoral College

2008-02-15T13:58:00.003-06:00

In a time when many are calling for the elimination of the Electoral College, I believe that we shouldn't eliminate but in fact make it stronger. Why do I think this is a good idea? Because I do not think the American people are best suited for electing a president.

The voting for president should not be a popularity contest. In fact, the founders thought that the office should look for the man, not the man for the office. (Now a days we can say man or woman...)

I really think that we should take the electoral college system one step further: members of the electoral college should decide for themselves who will be president. You may be thinking, that's not Democratic and takes away the people's voice. I ask you to hang in here as I try to explain my reasoning.

First I really think that the common man or woman are not in a position to know what kind of person the office of the presidency needs. This is a generalization but think about this:

What do the following know about the requirements for the office of the presidency, or who will be best suited as a president?

An 18 year old fresh out of high school.
A grocery store cashier.
Your average pastor or priest.
A project manager in some IT shop.
A stay at home mom.
A taxi driver.
A doctor.
A lawyer.
A welfare repeat user.
The guy who picks up your garbage.
A fashion model.
A software developer.
A drug addict.

Reading through this list might make you whence. You may think that some may know better than others. It could be that the garbage truck driver does know more than the lawyer. In general, I really think that most people lack the wisdom and technical ability to select a president. We do however know people who we consider wise, who have proven themselves to one degree or another. I think that the electoral college should be made up of these wise people. We should elect these people to choose our president.

Another degree of separation with which I would be very comfortable is to have the state legislatures themselves choose the members of the electoral college. One side benefit is that the state legislature would be better watched by the people. As it is now, it seems that the people are more focused on the Congress in Washington than the legislatures in their own states.

Bottom Line: The American public is not fit to elect an American President. They are more fit, to elect an American Idol.

State Owned Telecoms and ISPs - Not So Good Idea

2008-02-15T08:33:00.003-06:00

The state owned telecom here in Costa Rica is ICE (pernounced /ee-say/). ICE also oversees RACSA, the state owned ISP. ICE is the only phone company in Costa Rica. RACSA is virtually the only ISP (they have given a concession to at least one cable ISP that I know of.) This cable ISP has the right to provide internet to about 10 or 20 city blocks in downtown Cartago.

Late December, a friend of ours agreed to lease me some space for an office. Immediately, we went to ICE to apply for a telephone line. Finally, during the first week of February the line was installed. It took them about 6 weeks! We got it this quick because we know someone in ICE and we kept hounding him. I still cannot use the office though because now, I'm waiting on ICE/RACSA to get the internet connection going for me!

We've been told that RACSA is out of internet ports. They're waiting on users to cancel their internet service, from there the port will be returned to a pool. There is a waiting list of at least a 1000 people in front of me. This is their story. We do have the option of transferring our existing port (that I'm using right now) from our home to the office. No word right now on when that can be done. 6 weeks ago, they gave me the impression that it would be something that could be done almost immediately. I'm still waiting........

This is just my case. How many other business people are suffering in Costa Rica because of this slow state-owned monopoly? Fortunately, there is an answer that will be coming in the future. That answer is competition via CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Agreement.) I'm not really a proponent of this agreement because of concerns about eroding national sovereignties; however, this agreement is going to allow for competition to exist in the telecom industry here in Costa Rica. These companies are going to come in here and eat ICE's lunch. It will be a much welcomed change on my part.

Socialized Medicine is a BIGGER Problem

2008-02-11T08:28:00.000-06:00

As many of you know, I am 100% against any kind of socialized medicine.

Reason #1: Socialized Medicine is blatantly unconstitutional. The opening paragraph of the Constitution says (my emphasis in bold):

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. "

Notice that the common defense is to be provided (that is a role of government); however, the general welfare is to be promoted (the government should do things to promote the general welfare of the citizens - not provide it) In many cases this is simply just getting out of the way of the private sector.

Also, notice the verbage: "and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity". Any act of the government confiscating property or income from one group of people and redistributing it to another is not a form of Liberty. It is a form of servitude or slavery.

Reason #2: It goes against basic economics - supply and demand. The more demand that exists for a service or a product the higher the price for that commodity.

If the Federal Government steps in to provide health care for the masses, the demand will increase. The poor and even parts of the middle class have absolutely no restraint. If they have something for free, they will abuse it. This abuse for health care will manifest itself in the over use of medical services. With this increase demand the prices of health care will go up. Doctor's and other medical professionals will be able to charge higher prices. There will even become a greater shortage of nurses.

Who will pay for these higher prices? Tax payers will in the form of higher taxes. Once the tax payers complain too much, government will then go back to the medical industry to set some kind of price controls. Once this happens, the quality of health care will plummet. It will be nothing like it is today.

Part of the problem with health care now is that the Federal government and the states already participate in socialized medicine to some degree. This has already caused the price of medical services to increase. In the cases where the government has a cap on what it pays out, doctors and hospitals regain their losses by charging a little more to other clients for other services.

The Solution
1. We need to get away from employer based health care. A side benefit to this is that whatever the business sells will go down in value because the embedded cost of employee health care will not be present. Putting extreme pressure on someone to stay with an employer because of a child with some kind of illness is a knock against Liberty.
2. We need to quit using insurance for general doctor visits; this causes insurance premiums to be higher. When you take your car for an oil change or service, do you use your insurance?
3. HSAs appear like they may be part of the solution. HSAs are great in that we can save money tax free for medical expenses. Usually an HSA comes with a high deductible. We should only use insurance for worse case scenarios anyway. In doing this, insurance premiums will be much lower. Having something like a high deductible HSA makes sure that the user shows restraint on the use of medical services. This also helps the price of medical services go down in general.
4. Do not use tax money to buy medical services for anyone. If someone is too poor to go to the doctor, then I call on Christians to step up to see to it that the children of the poor are taken care of. In the US we have many great charities like the Red Cross and Salvation Army. Why would a charity be better than the government? A charity helps insure some kind of restraint on many levels. With the government, a person is demanding for the service and does not see the true expense. With a charity a person generally feels more appreciative and will be less likely to abuse as they realize that the expense was paid for by a generous person. I also want to point out that the poor in the United States are wealthy compared to the poor in Bolivia, many parts of Africa, South East Asia and many other parts of the world. We don't have it that bad at all in the US.
5. Let the private sector solve this problem The government needs to back off a little bit and let the private sector step up. In a free market society, where a problem exists an enterprising person is not held back and can provide an economical solution. When you have a bunch of creative people competing with each other the price of that solution drops.

I'm interested in your comments. Please critique this and help me make this article better.

Crown Update

2008-01-28T11:18:00.000-06:00

We are scheduled to start Crown on Feb 14th. (Yes Valentines day, because of that we may move the date). This time around we have 6 or 7 people for the group. Not as much interest as last time; however, one couple who completed the course in November approached us about being co-leaders this time around. I was impressed that they took the initiative. We're also going to get another couple or individual to help co-lead too, as way to grow the Crown leadership in the church faster.

Christian Dog

2008-01-28T11:05:00.000-06:00

Yesterday at church during the sermon, a dog walked down the center aisle shortly after the preaching started. At first, he sat down about midway down. One guy hissed at him to get him to leave. The dog just got up and walked closer to the pulpit. He finally laid down about 7 rows or so from the front. He remained there the entire sermon.

Hillary buying votes with my and your money

2008-01-12T07:55:00.000-06:00

Typical Democrat tactic. Typical Socialist tactic.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0108/7842.html

Right winged tree huggers?

2008-01-07T10:42:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, Bryan broke a tree limb while sitting in a hammock. The Costa Ricans with us suggested that we just rip the limb right on off and not worry about it. However both Bryan and I saw that the limb had a chance and could be mended back to the tree. We bought 30 meters of twine and fixed it the best we could. Bryan thinks that the limb may have a 50% chance of healing.

We both thought it very ironic that the two most anti-socialist, staunch republicans there were the only ones who took action and made an effort to fix the tree.

Do you like cats?

2007-12-22T16:23:00.000-06:00

Almost every night, I hear something walking around on my roof. My roof is made out of some kind of galvanized tin; save the garage, where about a 5 x 10 foot portion of it is some kind of foggy plexy glass. My wife says that what we hear walking around is a cat or cats. A few months back, I even ran up there one day to investigate a noise only to scare a gray cat with yellow eyes. I remember those eyes clearly, because he looked at me with such terror as in disbelief that a human was up there with him. A split second later he dashed like lightning off the back of my house into the neighborhood behind mine.

Even after that incident, we still hear something walking around on our roof from time to time and almost always at night.

Well today has been a kind of rainy, lazy take it easy kind of day. The wife is out doing Christmas stuff and I've been hanging out here with the kids. I've been at this computer for the last 2 hours: checking email, working on a web app and reading the drudgereport while they were napping.

My son just informed me that there's cat crap on the roof. All kinds of questions went through my mind of course, so I just asked him how he knew. He pointed to a black spot on the garage's plexy glass ceiling. I thought it was leaf, so I said, "that's just a leaf." He said that it wasn't. So I went right under and looked up. He's right.

Errrrrrrrr!!! Big goverenment, the Federal Reserve and uninformed / irresponsible citizens

2007-12-14T10:45:00.000-06:00

I'm so frustrated. What can I say? I do what I can to make sure that my finances are in order. My family works off a budget. We do not sacrifice raising the children that God has entrusted to us for a better lifestyle - i.e. we don't have a HUGE mortgage on a HUGE house. We have a 10 year old car so that we don't have to have a car payment. We try to pay cash for everything in order to not go into debt (Debt by the way is a form of slavery). We do all of this so that my wife can stay at home with the kids and so that I too can spend more time with them.

We do all that we can to not over spend and live below our means and for what? For the Federal Reserve and BIG government to encourage banks to loan money to people who do not have their act together? To a bunch of irresponsible credit junkies?

These people are loosing their homes, their cars and their shirts and I would say in almost all cases rightfully so! And now what? We hear the network news guys saying things like:

"The Fed is pumping billions of dollars into the economy to help out with the credit crisis".

What does this mean? I'll tell you what this means because I'm experiencing this first hand - its painful - and you will too over time.

This means that somebody at the Fed goes over to a laptop and pushes a few keys to "create" money out of thin air. They then push that newly created digital money to the banks. Let me explain the result of this, I'll try to keep it brief.

This is causing immediate and major inflation of our dollar. Our dollar is worth less every time they do this. If you have cash in hand, it is worth less than the day before the Fed does this. How much? About 4% less or so.

I live in Costa Rica. For the first time that I have known of, the dollar has fallen against the Costa Rican colon. What does that mean? My food costs more. My gas costs more. Everything costs more.

What does that mean for you? Your money is worth less on the global market.

What I'm not sure about though:

Is your house worth less? Well, if you're trying to sell it right now and you have it on the market for lets say $200,000. You put it on the market last week. Today the Fed created more money. You have your house for the same price: $200,000. Your house is worth $200,000 in todays dollars and its worth about $192,000 in last months dollars. Do you see what I mean?!

Maybe, if you don't sell your house, over time, the market will correct itself and the price will go up appropriately. In this case by market, I mean the housing market. Maybe, it will correct itself and reflect the true value of your house in today's dollars and not last months dollars. But how long will that take?

The same goes for any money that you have in Savings or 401K plans. Lets say that you have $100,000. Well that money is worth less now than it was last month. Maybe though, that too will correct itself over the next year and it will increase as our inflation has. (I hope so.....)

My opinion about this? Let those irresponsible people in foreclosure figure it out on their own or with help from private parties. The market needs to eat them (figuratively). This is the fastest way for us to move on. Even Clark Howard says this.

My greater opinion on this? Get us back on the gold standard and eliminate the Federal Reserve. Bottom line, (SO LISTEN UP HERE): The Fed is a private entity. Its not of the government. Don't let the name trick you. This private entity creates money out of thin air and loans it to us and our government at an interest! How absurd is that??? This private entity, the Federal Reserve, is ultimately owned by private individuals. It is to the benefit to these individuals that our government grows, becomes more socialist, takes more responsibility from the private sector, creates more wars, has socialized medicine, welfare, etc...... Why? Because it needs to borrow more of this imaginary money at an interest to be paid back to the Federal Reserve (to these private individuals).

So there you go. I guess that's why Republicans are good at war and Democrats are good at taking care of irresponsible people.

One more thing. What does this mean for me? Well I'm a hustler, I'm a fighter, I'm a schemer and more important than that, I trust The Almighty. I've seen Him do nutty stuff. CRAZY stuff. Sure yeah, I'll keep scheming. I have to. But I know that there's a way out for my family and me that will be provided by The Provider. Not sure what it is right now. But there is one.

No PC for me please

2007-11-22T22:52:00.000-06:00

Ha Ha Ha! There's been a Political Correctness backfire in retail America. You know how when you're leaving some big chain store (or mall store) after shopping this time of the year and they say to you "Happy Holidays". If you're like me, there's something inside of you that's actually bothered by that simple phrase; and if you're like me you say back to them "Thanks, Merry Christmas :-)".

Well, it looks like this silly political correctness is backfiring. How funny. These retail giants try not to offend anyone with their "Happy Holidays" but end up offending a huge base of clients called Christians (which by the way are part of the majority religion in the USA).

Why be so politically correct? I really don't get it. If I were in Saudi Arabia during Ramadan and someone said something like: "Happy Ramadan" or "Happy fasting" or something like that, I would gladly respond back to them the same greeting with no qualms about it whatsoever.

Well, it turns out that some of these stores are wisening up. I heard on the news the other day that Wal-Mart is making the switch to now use the phrase: "Merry Christmas".

I used to think that I was probably the only one offended or bothered with the blatant omission of any reference to my Savior in that greeting but it looks like you and everyone else were too.

Living Debt Free being part of a Faith Walk

2007-11-21T16:56:00.000-06:00

Today, I've been listening to Dave Ramsey, like I do a lot. He was giving a high incomed fellow advice on whether to buy a house now or wait two years for the cash to be there to just pay for it. While giving the advice, Dave said something like buying things without debt is part of his faith walk.

For Dave, when he wants to buy something whether its a car, house or starting a business; its a spiritual decision. When he's saying that its part of his faith walk, I interpret that to someone buying like this:

"God, I want to buy something; but I do not have the resources to buy it. I will do my part in looking for those resources so that I can obtain what I'm trying to buy and at the same time I will trust you to provide that which I am seeking."

This does spin into a tangent that I won't address in this post and that being that perhaps God does not want you to buy that something (hence, perhaps that's the reason why you shouldn't use credit to obtain it).

One interesting idea is that if you use credit to purchase something then perhaps you are short circuiting God's provision.

But in the USA, they say that you have to have a mortgage to buy your home. But, does it have to be this way?!

Well, back in the United Social America

2007-11-09T21:27:00.000-06:00

I've been in Georgia for a week now. Well a week tomorrow. I flew stand by and managed to fly back in 1st class. This was a first time for me. I have to say that I really enjoyed it. It was quite a treat.

Work has been interesting. We have a new VP who's a soldier. The guy does not take any crap and is cracking the whip on everybody. This has been going on for almost 2 months now. I have to say, that it is a welcomed change though on my part. It is a challenge.

I'm carless right now. Been getting around on MARTA. So far so good.

I was about 3 days shy of being in Costa Rica for 6 months straight. This is the longest time that I've ever been abroad.

Interesting enough, on Tuesday evening, after my first day back in the office, I was walking to the MARTA station. I twisted my ankle on a divot in the side walk. I had a flashback to my first day working from an internet cafe in Costa Rica. That night, I also twisted my ankle while walking on the side walk (See earlier blog post) . This time as well as that time I feared that I would not be able to run for awhile; however that wasn't the case as Thursday I ran a pretty good 4.4 mile going between my sister's and my granddaddy's neighborhoods.

Tomorrow, God willing, the rest of my family will be here. Speaking of the phrase "God willing", Costa Ricans (as well as other hispanics) use a variation of that phrase constantly: "si Dios quiere" ("if God wants" or "if God wills it") . The apostle Paul talks about this in one of his letters saying something like don't say you plan on going to this city or that and'll do business for a time you should say if God wills it then ...... etc.

Crown update

2007-10-22T15:04:00.000-06:00

We are 70% through the Crown study. We decided to split up into 2 groups. Meyling has one and I have the other.

Meyling has 11 people. I had 11 but am now down to 10. One lady had to drop it due to recently becoming pregnant and the added stresses and complexities because of that.

Its really exciting. We have 3 more weeks to go and are on track with 21 people graduating! These folks are motivated, dedicated and excited about making wise changes in their lives and seeing God do BIG things.

In my group, every person is capable of leading this study. I'm hoping at least half of the them lead a Crown study in the next year. God willing, we will do one or two more at this church in January 2008.

On a lighter note, whoever is in charge of the bulletin keeps leaving in there: "Thursday night: Bible study at 7:00 pm". The problem is, that Bible study is not going on and has not happened in months! We've had 2 people show up, each on 2 different occasions thinking that one of our Crown classes was "The Bible Study". The thing is, crown is designed to be a closed small group Bible study. Once started, no new members should be admitted in. This is to maintain consistency and promote a more intimate small group study.

The funny thing, in this church of about 200 people or so, only 2 people have come looking for the Bible study in the past 7 weeks!

Fine Culture

2007-09-20T09:47:00.000-06:00

Every September, this is what folks in my home town do on Saturday night of Buggy Days. One time I almost had that pig. I was about 8 or 9 years old. My dad told me to not run with the crowd but to stay in the open and the pig would eventually run to me. Well the pig did and I grabbed that joker by its hind legs. He was slippery cause they'd greased em up before the chase. I had em for about 2 seconds and then Brian Nicholas jumped on me and that pig just slipt on away. Oh well.....

Crown in Cartago, Costa Rica

2007-08-28T08:32:00.000-06:00

Finally, looks like Meyling and I are going to be able to facilitate a Crown group in her home church in Cartago, Costa Rica. This is something we've been wanting to do for 8 years now! Pastor Esteban and his wife have been very supportive of our efforts and plan to be in the first group. This past Sunday, Aug 26th the announcement was made in front of the church. From that announcement, we got a list of 26+ people. I was told that even more we're interested but for some reason, failed to get their names on the list because of miscommunication or something.

We have a problem here but it is a good problem. We can only have 12 to 14 people max in a group. Because of so much interest I want to do 2 groups. The Crown office in Costa Rica has already told us that they cannot provide additional facilitators, but they can provide us a 4 hour leadership training session. Two 'leader' couples have already shown some interest in doing the study but I have not approached either one of them yet about facilitating a group.

My idea right now, is to try to get both couples to lead a group together with Meyling and me giving them some support while Meyling and I facilitate a group ourselves. I'm overwhelmed in a good way not in a bad way. I'm overwhelmed at how God just dumped all of those people in front of us. I thought after the announcement that we would have 4 or 5 people in a group. Frankly, I'm just shocked at how many people are wanting to do this.

The size of the church is about 350 members. They had about 200 adults there last Sunday. This also just happened to coincide with Pastor Esteban being voted in as the official pastor of the church.

In case you're wondering what Crown is, it is a 10 week Bible study about money. It covers many topics some of which are debt, savings, work, tithing, retirement and training children. The general philosophy of Crown is that our money and our possessions are not ours but in fact belong to God and are on loan to us from God Himself. Therefore we are not owners but actually stewards and must administer these things in such a way that is pleasing to God.

Dave Ramsey has a similar course. See the following links:

http://www.crown.org
http://www.daveramsey.com

Fighting for Jesus

2007-08-17T09:56:00.000-06:00

Right now, the boy is riding around in the garage on his scooter singing, "I will fight for you Jesus", "Jesus help me fight for you". What do I do? Do I let it go or do we have a theological discussion? At least he's also singing, "Jesus loves me", "I love you too Jesus."

Some Urban Outdoors Man stories

2007-08-10T08:50:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, while dropping off the boy at school (its not a traditional school, they run around and play the whole day) I almost ran over an urban outdoors man sleeping on the side of the road. I was turning right off the two lane paved (busy) main road onto a dirt road. The Urban Outdoors man was sleeping on the side of the dirt road. As I made the turn, he was on the starboard side of the 4x4 vehicle that I was piloting. As I passed him, I honked the horn.

I dropped off the boy. On the return trip, I was determined to wake that fellow up. So I made my decent down the unpaved road and stopped right beside the man's sleeping area. I honked the horn and yelled at him to get up. I asked if he was worried about getting ran over. He slightly stirred but refused to acknowledge my presence. I had to move on, as another vehicle was turning left off of the paved road into the Urban Outdoors man's sleeping area.

Last Saturday, I saw a fellow at about 2:00 pm taking a nap laying perpendicular across the side walk. He was sleeping very very sound asleep as there was a lot of traffic passing by him and he was not moving.

There's this gas station on the west side of Cartago that has a lot of these outdoors man that come by to visit folks while they are filling up their gas tanks. About 2 months ago, when we were getting gas, within 3 minutes, 2 different outdoors men had come by the driver's side window and startled my wife. I had some cold french fries, so I gave one of them the fries. He was very happy and ate them on up.

There's this other dude that's kind of close to the Mas x Menos grocery store. (Pronounced Mas por Menos). This guy has to be about 20 years old and seems to have a serious cash flow problem as he's constantly walking around in the intersection approaching drivers of stopped vehicles at the traffic light asking for money.

About 2 years ago, when I was down here I was approached by an urban outdoors man requesting money. At first I ignored him acting like I couldn't speak Spanish (you know, playing the stupid gringo). This guy then started speaking to me in perfect English. I realized I couldn't ignore him, so we spoke in English for a while. I finally gave him some change. He had spent time in California doing construction work. His English was really good.

New Proposed Flag for US

2007-08-01T22:51:00.000-06:00

I'm proposing this as the new flag for the USA (United Socialist America.) Since we are becoming so communist in our mentality we should change our flag in order to keep up with the current culture. Friends, we are a far cry from those rugged, liberty minded individuals who settled our great land and made our country. Never mind that the preamble of our Constitution says "provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare". Now our government "provides the general Welfare and somewhat promotes the common defense". (Look at our border with Mexico)

I like this flag. Notice first of all, there are no more stars. Those stars are outdated representing a time in the past when we had different states, each with different opinions that frankly just get in the way of the "common" good. What business does a state (let alone a people) have governing themselves. With the states gone, its just THE ONE BIG FAT MAMA GUBERMENT takin care of us all.

The hammer and sickle represent the so called working class. I say so called, because that class can shrink on up as there is becoming less and less incentive to work because the fruits of their labor are being reaped by the BIG FAT ONE. To be honest, the hammer and sickle really represent serfdom and slavery. In reality, you are just a serf or a slave. To make you feel better about your condition though, we'll let you think that the hammer and sickle stand for the "working class".

Notice also even though there is the hammer and sickle representing the serfs, there is no symbol representing the entrepreneur, the owner, the owner-operator or any other category of class of a free nation with a diverse economy. That's because THE GUBERMENT holds all of those roles and titles. You are just a serf in this post-liberty feudal system.

Yes, you noticed that the 13 stripes are still there. That's there to make you think that you are still free. A token of patriotism of the past. A means to blind you of your current state. Well quit reading this and get back to work for the ONE GUBERMENT. If you're not working though, don't worry, they'll take care of you......

Have you put your kids on Commission yet?

2007-07-25T13:52:00.000-06:00

I'm listening to Dave Ramsey. He says that he hates "allowance"; you know, giving your kids money on some kind of schedule. He says that it sounds too much like welfare. His kids are on commission. The idea being - you work you get paid. You don't work, you don't get cash and you can't buy stuff. (Ha Ha) - [paraphrase of what Dave said.]

Dave also says that he just hates the word allowance.

What do you think?

What do you think?

2007-07-20T09:18:00.000-06:00

Any similarities?

Some pics (finally)

2007-07-20T07:23:00.001-06:00

Das Schloß This is the inside of our house. The door on the left is the front door from the garage. To the right of the table is the kitchen.

Nice View This pic was taken about half way up the mountain whose summit is Volcano Irazu. The city in the valley is Cartago. The direction of this view is due south. You can see the southern mountain range of the central valley. Less than 40 miles (south) from the point that this pic was taken is the Pacific Ocean. Following the road on the right will take you down to Potrero Cerrado and then to Tierra Blanca. I'm guessing that this point is 1.5 miles above sea level. If you get a 1980 version of World Book Encyclopedia you can see almost the same picture.

Some Random Costa Rican Kid On the way up to Volcano Irazu one day, I stopped in one of the towns and took a picture of this kid on the side of the road. Its kind of chilly at that elevation but he didn't seem to mind as he's wearing a tank top.

Costa Rican Street Dog

My Friend Mr. T

Transformers

2007-07-19T09:56:00.001-06:00

We saw Transformers last night. I have fond memories of the cartoon series. When I reminisce about watching the Transformers as a kid, I remember hanging out at Brandon Smith's house with my brother and other friends watching the show. I always liked the 80s cartoon despite the fact that parts of it were kind of cheesy. For example:

Megatron would turn into a hand gun.
Soundwave would turn into a stereo box.
Optimist Prime's trailer would always conveniently just fade away when we was transforming to humanoid mode. (Brandon would start ragging on the cartoon. He would say something like: "hey where did his trailer go.") If I remember correctly, his trailer would also just mysteriously show back up when he transformed back to a rig.

The movie fixed some of that. Megatron now turns into some kind of jet (which makes much more sense to me than a simple hand gun), Optimist Prime did not have a trailer and Soundwave was not introduced. Some online reviews though allude that the Police car was him or inspired by him or he was turned into a Police car or something.

In the movie, the robots seemed very realistic and scary. The fight scene at the beginning between the rogue helicopter Decepticon and the US military in Iraq; and the followup with that 50 foot long scorpion Decepticon fighting the remnant of US Special Ops fighters left over from the first fight with the helicopter were both awesomely disturbing.

However they could've done a better job developing the Transformer characters. Perhaps they'll do that in the sequels though.

It was really funny to me how the Decepticons (and the Autobots ) hunted down Sam via his ebay user id and auction listing. The Decepticon even quoted to him his auction listing number.

I liked the history that they introduced giving Sam and the Transformers a remote connection through a brief encounter between an ancestor of his and Megatron.

Starscream just didn't look like himself at all. Yeah he was bad and scary, but they should've made him look more like himself. The same for Megatron too. Also in the TV series, Starscream was a good fighter but had a wussy side to him. The wussy side was not shown in the movie.

All-in-all I really like the movie a lot. It freakin rocked! It not only did justice to the cartoon but improved upon it in my opinion.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0418279/

Chupacabra

2007-07-16T16:08:00.000-06:00

Last month, I created an ad on craigslist to give away a chupacabra that I had found. Unfortunately, I don't have a copy of that post. After about 3 weeks, it was finally flagged for deletion on craigslist. It was posted in the free section and went something like this:

Giving away one free chupacabra to the right family. It will take the right kind of owner as he's kind of nasty, although I've been trying to tame him and have had moderate success. Would also probably be best for a somewhat wealthy family as he goes through about 2 goats or a dozen chickens a day. Just got all of his shots up to date. If interested, please send me an email so that we can arrange a time for you to come and take a look at him.

Below are some of the best responses that I got.

From: D
Sent: Friday, June 29, 2007 11:26:40 AM
Subject: chupacabra

I already have one so I do not mind to have another
one. Send me some pics.

From: N
Sent: Thursday, June 28, 2007 5:24:30 AM
Subject: chupacabra

how do you have a chupacabra? do you have pics? i am interested - thanks -

My response to N:
No. We dont have any pics of it yet. But you can come and see it. Please take it. We are having a hard time domesticating it. I´m sure that with the right person, he´d make a good pet though.

N's follow up email:
chupacabra is supposed to be a mystical creature. do you have just a wild dog or something and you are calling him chupacabra? i have studied on this creature some and have found several different reported species of the same "animal". there are almost canine sightings almost alien sightings and almost reptile like ones. if you can show me pictures i would like that. i do not think if it was a real chupacabra then it could be domesticated. how did you aquire this nimal. please i would like more info. chupacabra fascinates me and i would be very interested but do not want to waste my time on a manged dog or something. thanks - n

From: John
Sent: Friday, July 6, 2007 9:10:50 PM
Subject: Chupacabra

Are you for real?

Sent from my iPhone

My response to John:

On Jul 11, 2007, at 10:11 AM

Some nice lady picked it up. She was real quiet and didn't have much to say. I wish that I'd gotten her contact info. Anyway, I'm glad that she did get that thing. I didn't like having it around.

John's follow up:

Sent: Wednesday, July 11, 2007 3:24:21 PM
Subject: Re: Chupacabra

What did she pickup? Who is this? Did someone e mail u from here?

Sent from my iPhone

my response:
Sent: Wednesday, July 11, 2007 3:32 PM
Subject: Re: Chupacabra

Hello John,

I received an email from your email address inquiring about the chupacabra that I was giving away. The chupacabra is gone, thank goodness. If I do find another one, and you're interested in it, I will let you know and then we could make further arrangements. Until then please take care.

Message from Craigslist

Your posting has been flagged for removal.

Approximately 98% of postings removed are in violation of craigslist posting guidelines.

Please make sure you are abiding by all posted site rules, including our terms of use:

http://www.craigslist.org/about/terms.of.use.html

If you need help figuring out why your posting was flagged, try asking in our flag help forum: http://forums.craigslist.org/?forumID=3. Include posting title, body, category, city, how often posted, any images, HTML markup, etc.

If your posting was wrongly flagged down (2% of flagged ads are) please accept our apologies and feel free to repost.

Sorry for the hassle, and thanks for your understanding.

My response to Craigslist:

No problem. I meant to take down the ad because it had sold already.

Thanks!

The beach: Palo Seco and Manuel Antonio

2007-07-12T12:21:00.000-06:00

Vacation at the beach

Palo Seco
Manuel Antonio
Kayaking
Manuel Antonio National Park
The ride home

Palo Seco
Last week, on the 4th of July, my parents came into town to visit. Finally, after being here for 2 months we took a family vacation to the beach for 3 nights and 4 days. Saturday, we left for Palo Seco. The strange thing, according to dad's gps, Palo Seco is about 37.5 miles directly south of Cartago. However to get there we had to do a wide semi circle going west through San Jose to Orotina and then rounding it out passing Jaco and finally getting into Parrita and then into Palo Seco. It took us about 4 or 5 hours to get there and was well over 100 miles.

We stayed one night in Paloc Seco at the Hotel La Tranquilidad. Palo Seco is a very very very undeveloped beach. All there is is a bunch of cocunut trees lining the beach for 5 miles. I'm guessing there's probably only 50 or 60 structures on the entire 5 mile island. The sand there is brown. Real estate prices for a 1/4 acre lot (beach front) are as low as $100K in some parts.

Most of the property there is being sold under concession. This is how it works. On the 1st 50 meters from the high tide mark no one can build anything. from 50 m to 150 m past the high tide mark, the local government owns that land but can grant concessions to people to develop it. When you own a concession, you own exclusive rights to the land to do pretty much what you will with it like titled property. When the concession is up, the current concession holder has first rights to renew it. I'll try to make a point to post something exclusively on concessions later.

Manuel Antonio
We stayed 2 nights in Manuel Antonio. One night at a hotel that has awesome views of the ocean. Its pretty high up on the side of a mountain. The drawback though is that its about 3/4 mile walk to the beach. The second night we stayed in a kind of ok hotel right on the beach.

Manuel Antonio is a very beautiful area. Its probably half developed. They're very careful there though to leave a lot of trees. The hotels on the beach are actually hidden back in the woods. The ocean/beach there is really nestled in a bay. The beach stretches for about 2 or 3 miles and makes a curve like a crescent moon but more U-shaped. On either end are rocky outcroppings and mountains. Its really a kind of wide bay there (but the waves are good).

Kayaking
On Monday, Meyling, Dad and I took 2 kayaks out into the bay. These are the type of kayaks that you sit on (not in). More like a cross between a canoe and a traditional sit-in-kayak. Out in the bay are a few rock formations / small islands. The closest one to us was about 600 m out (according to the guy at the kayak place.) They called them gemelas (twins). We paddled out to there to the gemelas.

Dad tried to go in between the gemelas from the ocean side. The passage is probably about 10 feet wide at the narrowest point. He was timing the waves, but didn't time enough, because as he was making his approach a huge surge of water about 4 or 5 feet higher than the norm came rushing through and flipped him over. He was ok and managed to save his GT hat too. I got to see it all in slow motion and almost get hit by him and his kayak at the same time!

Once he got his kayak righted and back on it, we went around to the ocean side of the formation to check it out. Waves were constantly attacking the gemelas. Dad wanted to go through from that side. Meyling and I quickly paddled back around to the beach side to watch him come through and help him out in case he got into any trouble. We had enough time to get ready to watch dad come through.

That time he made it through with no problem. He said that he watched the waves for a few cycles and noted that after 4 or 5 there was always a big one going through. After deciding it was safe, he assaulted the passage right on the tail end of a 'big one'. He made it out just fine.

After that, we snorkeled very briefly. The water was pretty turbulent and at the same time we wanted to stay kind of close to the rocks to see stuff. Meyling and Dad went first. Dad saw some fish and Meyling saw some rocks. After that I went, I saw some rocks too. Then Meyling went again determined to see a fish and finally she saw a blue one.

After that we paddled around went out a little further to some other rock formations and then went back in.

Manuel Antonio National Park
On Tuesday, the day we left for home, we took a tour of the Manuel Antonio park. Our guide showed us a few 3 fingered sloths, some monkeys, lizards, bats and spiders. To his credit, we wouldn't have seen many of the animals without his help. He even brought along a telescope on a tripod to see the animals better. Our tour group consisted of us and a couple from Holland.

After the tour we got into the ocean (at the beach in the park.) The slope of the beach was pretty steep making the waves very powerful as they crashed on the beach. Once the girl came running out to be with me and the boy. She was suddenly flipped on her back and then flipped over completely and finally another wave was dragging her out as it receded. As she was going out, I was already there to snatch her up. She was fine but really upset and shocked as you can imagine.

The ride home
On the way back, the kids got pretty nauseated when we were going through the mountains. The girl actually ended up presenting her lunch. We had to stop a bunch of times, but it was better for everybody. All in all, I guess it was a rough day for the girl.

A Knock Against Liberty

2007-06-15T08:35:00.000-06:00

Costa Rica's president Oscar Arias just recently broke ties with Taiwan in order to establish ties with Communist China. I'm shocked for two reasons:

1) Costa Rica is a democracy, (albeit socialist). One would think that they would align themselves with another freedom loving democracy.

2) How can one man make such an important decision for an entire country? Appartently that's how it is in Costa Rica. Their congress doesn't have any say so in the matter. Strange.

Here's an interesting article about how China might try to take the liberty-loving "renegade province".
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/10/frontpage/defense.php

Errrrrr 1

2007-06-10T17:46:00.001-06:00

We´ve been here for over a month now and still have not aquired a place to live (renting or buying.) It´s really getting to my wife. There have been two places that we kind of liked.

1) Up in the air. At first Meyling hated the place, but after seeing a bunch of rat holes, she decided that it wasn´t so bad. I like that place a lot. The rent would be about $325/month. The problem right now is that the owners want us to sign a 1 year contract. We´re extremely hesitant to do that. We´re asking for a 6 month contract. They´re thinking about it....

2) Communication is more than half the battle. This is a house in a very decent area of town. Meyling thought that I didn´t like it because it really doesn´t have a back yard and there weren´t any security bars on the front windows. I thought that Meyling didn´t like it because it didn´t have a telephone yet. All in all, we both we´re happy with it, but it rented before we talked about it. It would´ve been $308/month and the land lord said that 6 months was better than a year. What´s the point of even writing this?

After a miserable week, I think we´re on the same page even though we´re on different sides of that page.....

Some funny things

2007-06-04T15:32:00.000-06:00

One day I saw a guy riding a bicycle and smoking a cigarette.

I saw a guy riding a bicycle with an open umbrella going up a steep hill.

I've seen several cases of 2 people on one bicycle in heavy traffic. Once I saw 2 teenagers one peddling and the other on the handlebars laughing and screaming obscentities at the guy pedaling.

Several times while I'm out running in the mornings, I've seen a dad with his son or daughter sitting on the cross bar. In all cases it looked like they were on their way to the school.

Twice I've taken an unlicenced taxi to get home. These taxis are called pirate taxis. When I got to the house, my wife asked me how I got home so I told her. My 4-year-old found it extremely interesting and said that he didn't know that there was such a thing as a "pirate" taxi.

We looked at an interesting piece of property that's forsale about a week ago. The couple live next to his mom. Over the years, they've added on to their house in pretty much any direction. They have 2 rooms that cross the property line, each room sitting half on the mom's lot and half on theirs. There are two filled in swimming pools in the back yard. One rectangular that now has corn growing out of it. The other is circular and encompasses part of the rectangular one. Again, both are filled in. Nevertheless it was all very interesting.

The other day my sister-in-law lost her voice, I told my4-year-old that it may be in the back yard and that we needed to find it. He looked for it for a while.

Week 2 coming to a close

2007-05-17T17:53:00.000-06:00

Finally my brother-in-law has DSL in his house. Half of yesterday and all of today I've been able to work here. We're still having trouble getting my Linksys router to talk to the modem. Hopefully that'll be resolved soon.

No more internet cafes for a while. I'll miss the atmosphere a little. Those places were mainly filled with kids from 12 to 23 years old. Some of them would spend hours playing these blood and guts shoot-em up first person shooter games. Others would spend hours chatting or looking at music videos or something.

I'm kind of rambling now: There were 2 internet cafes that I went to in Paraiso. One opened up at 7:00 am but my VPN would not work there. This one was like a dungeon and was way in the back of a building behind several shops. The internet cafe itself was long and narrow about 15 yards deep and 3 yards wide. Sometimes the kid running it had some incense burning. The walls were all black.

The other internet cafe just up the street opened at sometime after 9:00 am. This one was kind of like a party. It never opens at the same time. Many days I'd show up at 9:00 and it wasn't open. Same type of clientel as the other one, but the place was more lively. The guy running that place is Jimmy. He's 22 or so and is studying to be a computer programmer. I say it was kind of like a party because he was always playing party dance music there. The advantage that this place had over the other one was that my VPN worked there.

If you want a sample of the music. Go to this url. In the bottom right corner click "Radio en vivo". Then you'll have a chance to choose one of 3 programs for streaming.
http://www.911laradio.com/

Both places charge 100 colones / hour. That's about $0.19 / hour.

First update

2007-05-10T10:06:00.000-06:00

We arrived here in Costa Rica last Saturday (5 days ago). Today is Thursday. I've been able to successfully work form internet cafes all this week. I started with one in Cartago that cost me about $0.58 and hour. I've found another one in Paraiso (means Paradise in English) for $0.19 an hour. I'm mostly there now. Meyling's brother is tyring to get DSL in his house for me. When that happens his house will be my office during the day.

The views here are spectacular. I never can get used to them.

We're trying to find a house to rent or to buy. During the day Meyling is out doing that. In the evenings she shows me what she's found. Currently we're staying with her folks.

So far so good. This internet cafe is about 4 or 5 miles from the house. It takes me about 20 minutes to get here. Part of the time standing aroud waiting for the bus the other part of the time on the bus. The bus trip costs about $0.27 one way.

Last Monday night, I bent my right ankle by stepping on an even part of the side walk. The thought of not being able to run for a while really scared me. This thought came to mind becasue a similar thing happend to me in Costa Rica during Feb of 2004. I couldn't run for 9 months after that one! Anyway Tuesday it was bothering me. But now its almost better. I'm going to wait until next week before I go out running again.

My kids are having a big time with their grandparents.

Amy, Meyling's folks' dog keeps barking and nipping at our dog Tica. It's getting better though. They're almost putting up with each other now.

That's pretty much it for now.

Round 1over - a little back ground

2007-05-10T09:35:00.000-06:00

We've been in Costa Rica for 5 days now. Our flight arrived last Saturday afternoon. That night, I slept 11 hours. It seems that since around my dog's birthday (January 14th) we've been moving non stop. Around that time we started working on the house to get it ready to sell for early Spring. We spent many weekends with the help of Miguel and Sarita and their son Esteban trying to whip that place into shape. ( Let me tell you, Miguel is one of the fastest people I've ever seen turn out quality work. Man he's fast.)

During the time of getting ready, our good friend from our small group, Rhonda (a real estate broker) lent us some of her wisdom by giving us key pointers on what to do in order to get the most bang for the least effort. This helped us tremendously. She even chose the colours for the paint and we even liked her colours more than ours!

After many hard weekends, we finally got the house on the market the 1st of March. Technically, it wasn't in the MLS until that Friday or Saturday afterwards. The long of the short of it is we had a bonified offer the following Tuesday. We worked with that and finally came to an agreement with the prospective buyer. After fixing all the things that the buyer and I agreed to fix from the inspection report, the house sold April 10th.

You would think that at that point we would be on the home stretch. The week before the closing date and the next week after we had 2 garage sells. We sold sold and sold. It was crazy. Then what was left we had to get into a 10x15 foot (8 foot ceiling) storage area (that was no easy task!) or ship to Costa Rica. (We did leave a few items with family members scattered around the north Atlanta area.)

Thanks to Meyling's sister Lindsay and her husband Bryan's generocity we stayed with them a little over 3 weeks after selling our house. (Incrediblely they still love us!)

During the 3 week period after selling our house, I even kept coaching my son's soccer team (the 3 year old Strikers). It was quite a haul from Lawrenceville to Newtown park in Johns Creek! Some days I even went from Buckhead to Lawrenceville to get my boy; and then from there to Newtown Park. (That was usually 2 hours of driving!) Concerning the game of soccer, I am by far no expert. I just love my boy and wanted to be his coach. I could not believe how attached I got to the other kids on the team though! One even told me at a practice: "Coach, I love you". It was heart wrenching!

During that 3 week period, every minute of every day was consumed by something. Finally, getting to Costa Rica has brought me from crazy busy to normal. Meyling on the other hand is still pretty busy.

Patterns in the Randomness

Convert Blocks of Text To One LIne

Paste your blocks of text here:

Crown Update

What do you trust?

Your SUV and George Bush are destroying Mars!

Airing Laundry In Public

You are responsible for yourself

Boldness and Conviction

Can God Be Impressed?

Kick His @$$

Transformer Politics

The Police State

Transformer Politics

Crown Update

77 Years Ago and Approximately 25 Percent of My Collective DNA

The Woes of Traveling Between 2 Countries

Door Mat or Place Mat?

Chimeras, Polygamy and the IRS

New rules for dating

UFO in Costa Rica playa Carrillo - Samara

Democrats and Communist

The price of Liberty

Let's Strengthen the Electoral College

State Owned Telecoms and ISPs - Not So Good Idea

Socialized Medicine is a BIGGER Problem

Crown Update

Christian Dog

Hillary buying votes with my and your money

Right winged tree huggers?

Do you like cats?

Errrrrrrrr!!! Big goverenment, the Federal Reserve and uninformed / irresponsible citizens

No PC for me please

Living Debt Free being part of a Faith Walk

Well, back in the United Social America

Crown update

Fine Culture

Crown in Cartago, Costa Rica

Fighting for Jesus

Some Urban Outdoors Man stories

New Proposed Flag for US

Have you put your kids on Commission yet?

What do you think?

Some pics (finally)

Transformers

Chupacabra

The beach: Palo Seco and Manuel Antonio

A Knock Against Liberty

Errrrrr 1

Some funny things

Week 2 coming to a close

First update

Round 1over - a little back ground