* sigh * Friday...

This has been a crazy week. Many crisis situations and have come up and I have more than my fair share of conduct meetings this week. You through in some Preview Days work and I am ready to call it a weekend. I'm on duty this weekend, which will actually be good! It might force to relax and stop doing everything on the planet ;).

Some stuff on the to-do list:

1. Play AD&D tomorrow. Yay!
2. Watch the Packers in my apartment...on Fox! Glad that's all resolved.
3. Sleep in on Saturday. Well, sleep in for me. That's probably until about 9. ;)
4. Play some video games! I'd like to try out Forced Unleashed.

OK kids. Be good this weekend. Let me have a quiet weekend.

To Missouri and Back

I arrived back in Oshkosh on Sunday afternoon after driving to and from Kirksville, MO with an RA Conference in the middle. It made for a long weekend, but an enjoyable one as well.

The UW Oshkosh delegation did quite well. They presented two programs and one of them won a top five program award. Two pairs of UWO students participated in the case study competition and one group won. They represented their school well.

I presented two programs and "advised" the delegation, but they really didn't need an advisor. I also logged over 1,000 driving a 15-passenger. Needless to say, I aam relaxing tonight because I want to squeeze in a little weekend ;).

Heartland Conference

This weekend I will be in Kirksville, MO for the Heartland Conference. We're leaving at 7:00 AM on Friday morning and won't be back until Sunday last afternoon/evening. Not since the days of my WURHA advising have I had the chance to go to a student conference. It will be cool to be back in that environment.

I will be delegation advisor for nine CAs & PAs on our campus who are going. We are presenting four programs as a delegation. I'd hesitate to call this a vacation, but it will be nice to get away for a little while.

Interesting side note: We are taking a vehicle from Enterprise down. The vehicle is not allowed to enter the state of Iowa. Bizarre.

Covenant Discipleship

I am currently reading the book Covenant Discipleship, and I am curious if anyone else has read the book or started a covenant discipleship group.

I have the concept of this book intriguing. It dates back to the times of John Wesley, when small groups of Christians met together to talk about their discipleship. They would hold each other accountable and would "watch over one another in love". The groups met weekly and were met as a supplement to regular church attendance.

In its current format as explained in the book, groups would put together and sign a covenant agreement. Each week, each person in the group would talk about each point in the covenant agreement (there are usually around 10 points in the agreement).

I find the accountability component of this very intriguing. I think it could vastly help one to grow in grace and be a better disciple. Thoughts?

Monday Shake-Up

Monday was going rather well...I had a great running session in the morning. I was sore afterward, but felt like my interval training put me in a position where I had nothing left to give. With a shortened meeting, I managed to get more of my task list done and even had time to take Christa our to eat at China King. Suh-weet!

Oh but the E-mails piled in. Issues I thought were resolved reappeared. Work I did not anticipate came out of nowhere. What was once a great day now took a nasty turn for the worse. I realize that it is part of the job. In fact, it's the party of many problems. Even more, our lives are built around problems...and solving them.

I say this not for sympathy; I say this because it's my blog and I can say what I want! ;) This is one of those days where you don't really get all that much validation that your doing your job well, or at least doing your job. You get so caught up in stuff, a lot of negative stuff, that it feels as though you aren't doing what you need to do.

Oh well, I suppose that is what comes with Monday. Back to work!

Sunday Wrap-Up

A few reflections of the weekend:

• The apartment looks and smells clean. It is nice to be able to walk around without obstructions. As busy as we both were, the apartment was getting pretty bad.
• The Homecoming parade seemed to lack life this year...there also seemed to be a lot less entries. I also saw that UW Whitewater beat us 44-3. I am surprised we picked last year;s national champs as our Homecoming game.
• Kickball today was a blast! I am glad that I had the opportunity to participate. I only hope that we will continue to get together and do that when the weather allows.
• The Packers won...and in convincing fashion. The offense (especially Grant and the running game) looked solid. Defensive coverage was really good. The team overall looked strong. It's a great way to go into the bye week. They have a game against the undefeated Titans when they come back from two weeks off.

Another Busy Weekend

Similar to last weekend, Christa and I will be out and about this weekend as well.

Friday - Christa and I are attending a reception for a new scholarship being step up for CAs and PAs on campus. It is being named after Kelly Warnecke who was a staff member for Residence Life when I was just beginning my leadership journey at UWO. It will be nice to reminisce with some folks from that era. I also imagine it will be an emotional event.

Saturday - Christa and I will be attending another wedding, this one again in the Milwaukee area. We will again need to drive back that night from the reception which will be another late night. At least time I will not be sick.

Sunday - I will taking part in a charity kickball event. Then, I will hopefully watch a Packer victory...in Reeve Underground.

There should be time to relax. I am looking forward to a break from what has been a pretty crazy two weeks of work.

What's Goin' On?

I have really appreciated being able to participate regularly in the Disciple class at Waukau UMC. The discussions are great and I like the idea of taking some time in my day to talk about my own Christian discipleship and how it fits into my life and the lives of others.

In our discussion yesterday, we talked about the time of prophets. We talked about how the Jewish people slowly, over time, began to deviate from the teachings and law of God. Despite the warnings of the prophets, things got worse and eventually the people were put into exile for a number of years.

I can't help but wonder if we are on the same track as Christians today. I look at our current financial crisis and wonder if God is trying to tell us that we put too much emphasis on money and financial issues. I wonder if our recent string of natural disasters stems as a wake up call that we have lost our way.

It doesn't take very long to realize we have lost our way. Our faith is being pushed aside by jobs, hobbies and other pursuits that have us racing so much from obligation to obligation, we can forget about God. Our society puts wealth, fame and status on a pedestal. Our country was founded on rugged individualism. We have lost our ability to look out for one another and realize who's really in charge.

It is frustrating, but it reinforces my call to ministry and most importantly, my call to discipleship.

Other News:

1. Thank you to Abby Sylvia for letting me know I am on the main website for Oshkosh & Appleton Big Brother Big Sisters! Nope...not smiling in that one. Maybe there's a smirk there.
2. Christa has her 2nd to last jazz concert tonight!
   

Get it Right!

November 4th is an exciting day. Not only will I turn 32, but it is Election Day and the constant barrage of political advertisement and signs will be over with. Tonight is the final presidential debate, and I really don't care. The debates have been boring and have not really been all the educational. How can there be a winner? No risks were taken. Nothing new was said.

I only wish people could understand that the problems we have now domestically and abroad are not the results of one man or one entity. Bush did not cause these problems. Clinton did not cause these problems. Congress did not cause these problems. Trust me...it was a massive group efforts. To hear McCain and Obama advertisements that put the blame on one person is just asinine.

Please spread the blame around because it deserves to be. Our system of checks and balances must not be working because the president does not get to singlehandedly turn the nation to the crapper. There is a Congress that passes laws. It is true of Bush and true of Clinton. They did not act alone. It will take the people to rise up and vote out corrupt and out of touch politicians, Democrat and Republican. Then thing might get better.

S0, get over your petty squabbles and acknowledge the larger issue. Government is corrupt and it needs a full-scale leadership change all-around. A new president isn't going to change all that much, sadly.

NHL?

The Brewers run is over. The Bucks don't look like they're gonna be all that good. The Packers are at 0.500, but I'm not sure if they are going to make a significant push this year. They barely got past a Seahawks team without their starting quarterback.

I was paging through a copy of Sporting News and saw a preview about the NHL. Hockey? An intriguing option. I've never followed hockey, even the Stanley Cup playoffs. The closest teams to cheer for would be in Chicago or Minnesota.

Is it worth it? Anyone want to chime in? What do you all think about the NHL?

Weekend on the Road

It would figure that the weekend that I need to do the most traveling this semester is the one that I am also sick. I'm not sure what happened, but I have the symptoms of a cold and they don't seem to be going away. Bleh.

On Saturday Christa and I will be traveling to Cedarburg for a wedding. We will leave at noon and won't get until late at night. On Sunday I will be traveling to Sturgeon Bay for a leadership retreat. I have to ready to travel at 7:15 AM and won't go back until 6 PM.

Somewhere in there I hope to enjoy some of the weekend...I realize the events will be fun, but some time to myself (and time to hang out with Christa) would be appreciated.

One Year!

This week signifies that I have been matched up with my little brother Isaac for one year. This is my second match through Big Brother Big Sisters and I have appreciated the time that he and I get to hang out.

Lately, we have gotten into a rut of playing Rock Band and playing pool which still remains fun. Next week, we will be watching Iron Man. I am pretty excited about that! Once the renovation are done at the YMCA we can get back to playing basketball. He'd probably like that...he kicks my butt regularly :). His basketball season will also be beginning soon. Go South Park!

I feel as though we have really started making a connection in the last few months and have started to talk about things other than sports and video games.

I appreciate that he and I share many of the same interests and I look forward to being able to hang out with him until June of 2009. We'll see if geography makes hanging out no longer possible.

Gaming Update

Our 1st Edition gaming group has been able to meet for three sessions this fall and also met over the summer. Sadly, I have been busy with other tasks and have not kept the blog updated. You may have noticed that I have submitted a lot of posts yesterday. I have caught up on what has happened over all the sessions and am trying to get caught up on other paperwork I have let go because of my work on ministry documents and because of hall opening tasks.

Feel free to check them out, or don't if it's not your thing.

Other News:

• I had the chance to meet with my candidacy mentor this week! It was nice to touch base...it had been 4-5 months.
• I am finally getting back into the Disciple bible class that I have started in last spring. With the craziness of opening behind me, things are getting back to normal...or close to normal ;).

Cool Brewers Off-Season Overview

As I have explained before, I follow the Brewers, but do not consider myself an expert. My friend Jason Bock was written a great blog entry about the future of the Brewer's players...from his perspective.

I think they could put a great team together...it would be sweet if they kept Sabathia. We'll see.

Need a Little Humor?

I should preface this by saying some of the things you see on this website are not completely appropriate, but many are quite funny. You can click a link to only show G rated material.

Anyway, failblog.org is a site that shows pictures and movies of unintentional (and sometimes intentional) things that happen which can be perceived as funny or sometimes tragically funny. Usually the caption makes it clear what kind of "fail" it is.

Enjoy!

Fitting...

The rain has begun to fall in the Fox Valley area...fitting for what can only be described as a sad day in Wisconsin sports.

The Badgers fall to Ohio State. The Packers fall to the Falcons. The Brewers lost their series to the Phillies, but did catch a home win and made the playoffs! :)

Some positive notes from the weekend:

1. Christa and I are 30,oooth or so in the world on Rock Band for the band The Hatin' Forkful.
2. We purchased and watched Iron Man on DVD. I knew there was a reason we bought an HD television.
3. I will be doing shopping this evening to by some new jeans and pants. They are sorely needed. We have a 30% coupon from Kohls!

Not a Good Start

The Brewers are 0-2 going into their game at Miller Park tomorrow. I would feel better about game 3 if Sabathia had pitched a strong game. I'm not sure what we have to throw at the Phillies that will extend the series. I am envious of those of you that have tickets for the game tomorrow. Go Crew!

I see that Bucks single game tickets go on sale tomorrow. With the move to pick up Jason Richardson, I thought the Bucks might be going places. Then I read this article. Now I am not quite as excited. In fact, I am bracing myself for another season of defense-less Bucks basketball. *sigh*

Apathy...

http://winneblogo.blogspot.com/2008/10/angry-republican-student-letter-in.html

In his post, the author talks about a Republican affiliated student who thinks there is a bias on campus. While I would be the first to admit that a college campus is going to generally be a liberal environment, I don't feel any bias on campus. If there is, join a group that can help balance it.

As for the feeling of apathy on campus, I can only wonder if students are disillusioned by the current status of the government. Our foreign and domestic concerns go fare beyond one president, Congress or one specific leader. It is definitely a group effort. I think many people, including many students, are just tired of the system and how it seems to screw them over.

I'm not sure if any candidate for president thrills me all that much. Obama and his ideas really scare me, so I will vote for McCain. But, he's no picnic either.

Getting involved in change is a start. In the end, though, I do agree with my dad. Term limits...for everyone. No more career politicians. That is probably our biggest problem in government. Let's start over. I think the system is great. It's the stinkin' people that are corrupting it.

Exercise: The Next Step

For my five to 10 consistent readers, you know that I have been running in the mornings for most of 2008. While I appreciate the improvements I have seen in my physical fitness with running, I wanted to work out muscle groups not used in running as well as try different cardiovascular opportunities. With my membership to the Student Recreation and Wellness Center, I have access to the group exercises classes. With this in mind I have the following routine set-up.

Monday: morning - interval training run; evening - Core Adrenaline exercise class
Tuesday: morning - recovery run; afternoon - Sports Conditioning exercise class
Wednesday: morning - long distance run
Thursday: morning - recovery run; evening - Definitions exercise class
Friday: morning - short tempo run
Saturday: lift weights

I have tried this for a few weeks now, and here are a few observations I have made so far:

1. Christa as joined me for the weightlifting work on Saturdays and that has been fun. There's a big difference between lifting with someone and lifting by yourself.
2. I am a lot more sore now. It's not the unhealthy sore...it's the sore that comes with a good workout.
3. Running does improve my cardiovascular endurance, but other forms of cardio still wipe me out really well. I look forward to being in even better shape.
4. While I have not necessarily lost as much weight recently, I do feel slimmer and healthier.
5. Exercising, while tiring, does overall give me more energy!