Re-treat?

This weekend Kelly and I went to a retreat for our burgening new church home “The River”. It was at a little town by Alberta beach called Sunset Pointe. I titled this the Re-Treat, because it was such a treat to go.

Its hard to sum up, or even categorize the experiences we had, because there were so many great moments. Its also hard because im running on 4 hours of sleep and am really tired.

Nurturing relationships:
Meeting people and having an excuse to spend quality time getting to know them – priceless.

Getting involved:
I was invited to lead the cooking team for dinner saturday night, a 3 hour affair of organizing and materminding almost a dozen people creating an enormous amount of food for 130 people, all from scratch. I was also invited to play bass in the worship band, something which has been burning in me for a long time now. (In the last few church’s I went to they did not “require” my assistance.)
So I would almost say instead of “Getting involved”, “Being included”

Having fun:
Had a fun game of munchkins, one night, and stayed up talking with a new freind till 3 AM another, all fun, all worthwhile.

In all, this experience has helped me realize a number of things about myself (future post material) and further solidified this church body as a body I want to be a part of.

Man my brain is like tar on a cold day right now, my eyes are drooping like the willow in my grandparents back yard, and my fingers are about as coordinated as a russian ballet dancer in the special class based out of chernobyl. Sleep calls my name.

Work work work makes Kris a dull boy.

Well the summer is coming to an anticlimactic end for Kelly and myself. As work winds down the school year winds up. For Kelly that means getting a new job teaching grade one at hoity toity Windsor Park school. For me it is far more casual in that i have to prepare for a new semester with what i hope are challenging and fun classes. Im very excited that all my classes start at the same time every day, and that Kelly’s new job situates her right next to the university.

I think im most excited that my job is finally over (tommorow). Not that it wasent fine and all. Fine like Meredith fine anyways. Its just a soul sucking, work ethic reducing, plain person making hell. The bright side i think is that i discovered the Jim Rome show, which is broadcasted on the Team 1260 everyday from 10-1. A means to an end i keep telling myself. Taking this summer job allowed us to save money to go to Ireland next summer, which I am excited about. There might even be money to go somewhere at christmas too.

All that aside, it gave me something to do, and a wonderful new appreciation for how great school is. Boy I cant wait to start school.

Helping Kelly get set up with her new job has been tiring, working all day for the city then after that at her old school first, to pack and transport boxes, and now at her new school setting up her new classroom. Tiredness aside though, I enjoy being in that atmosphere, and I love helping my lovely wife.

Lifes been good to me so far.
but God is always good.

The End is Near?

I’m looking toward my last week at work before the school year begins anew. In one sense I’m ridiculously glad that I’m almost done working for the city spraying delicious herbicides, but at the same time I’m forced to look back over the summer break and evaluate whether I have used it effectively as i should have.

Vacations were all the staying variety for Kelly and I this summer, in a bid to save money (to further our trip to Ireland next summer). Which were nice, as we got to stay at my parents nice big house while they were out of town for a while, but at the same time, crappy cause your still in the same city.
We watched many movies, which was kinda fun at first, then less so later on. I did far less painting, drawing, and writing than i anticipated, rather unfortunately. In all though, I enjoyed myself I would say.

Getting an almost 100$ power bill for a 600sq ft apartment was pretty fun. I wouldn’t take back the air conditioner for the world though.

I think the best part of my summer was just hanging out with Kelly and not having to think about the paper I should be writing, or the textbook I should be reading. Having a brainless job really can be rewarding SOMEtimes.

The Dark Knight

Now, I get it, okay, people LOVE their “Blockbuster” movies. But this new breed of movies that really got its legs with the “Pirates of the Caribbean” series, is excessive. The plot is so interspersed, or ill say “sprinkled” with conflicts and resolutions, its worse than a bad episode of Maury Povich’s “The Maury Show”, which is to say, most of them. The Hollywood directors and producers just love to have one massive plot driven, ecstasy inducing, mind boggling action scene after another, barely giving the watchers a breath in between for some token plot development. The roller coaster effect, I guess they like to call it, is ridiculous.

The Dark Knight is just the latest victim of the Hollywood movie making machine that must fit all movies in a tidy box. Now, the story line was good, and the acting for the most part (who gave Maggie Gyllenhall a job?) was decent, my beef is with the story that weaves all over, and offers twist after twist, till you can see it coming a mile away that this will NOT be the end, no there will be another 13 token action scenes in which we can see that bat wrestle with his internal moral dilemma of whether he should be bad or good, woo eee aa, wow that was gratifying. I had high hopes after watching Batman Begins, but this was another POTC with bats instead of pirates, and jokers and thugs instead of fishy dudes and squids. I just like a movie where the plot follows a path that the watcher can logically understand, and not need 300 plot twists (along with their token action sequences) to do it.

Hot Hot Heat… Not the Band

The dog days of summer, some call it. Right now it is probably the hottest it has been all year, and it will get worse for the next week or so.

Now some might say that this is good in a province that winters most of the year. I’m not against heat per say, as without it we would all be dead. I am saying that my air conditioner is insufficient against this onslaught of heat, and I sleep very poorly while sweating.

In other news, I actually ate well today. Vacation is generally an excuse to eat poorly, and although I have been following that modus operandi for most of my 11 day vacation, fortunately I am starting to get my act together (again). Instead of popcorn, during the movie I just watched, I had a protein bar. Oh joy.

I thought my car was broken. It would not shift into reverse, first, third or fifth. Being a 5 speed, this presented some problems. The best news of the day was also the most embarrassing. The open element air filter I had installed had fallen off and jammed the shifter linkage. If I had simply looked under the hood I would have saved myself 20$ and the opportunity to look a fool.

In better news, my Wife’s EI finally started coming in… 3 weeks before she can start working again. Ahh governmental adroitness.

I heard the definition of “Redneck” today on the radio. According to the organizers of the Canadian redneck games, a redneck is simply someone who works hard for a living and likes to have a good time. So that means I can be a redneck from New York who is a stockbroker at my day job and a gay parade bear in the evening. Right.

I have one thing to say about the Olympics, its more of a question than a comment. Is the J in Beijing soft or hard, because i keep hearing the people on CBC pronounce it with a hard J and its making my ears bleed.
Out.

So How Heavy is Your Toothbrush?

Funny thing. This morning i was brushing my teeth (with an electric toothbrush and toms natural toothpaste of course) when a rib in my mid back popped out of alignment and my muscles spasmed leaving me panting in pain while doubled over staring at the floor i was supposed to wash earlier in the week. And with good reason, it is getting dirty… Ick!. Anyways, it hurt, ALOT. So i called my chiropractor’s office and they slated me in for an hour from the incident, which was really convenient, because normally he was not in before 3PM on Wednesdays, but as he was going on vacation, he was making up for some lost time. Extremely long story short, he fixed me up, but the hiking trip to Blackfoot recreational park hit a dead end as soon as my back decided to crap out on me. Geez, I’m only 26.

So Kelly and I went and watched X-Files, the new movie. We are big X-Files buffs, we have all the seasons on DVD. We really liked the new movie, although were both a touch disappointed that there was no conspiracy going on, and no aliens. I mean whats the X-Files without some little grey men running around injecting people with strange things, or stealing their unborn children. Good times though, the popcorn was delicious.

Other good news, my uncle and aunt who live in China most of the time are here to visit Canada this summer and are staying at my parents place. We went over there and had dinner, with me cooking the chicken after using my scrumptious marinade. Its a secret.

Anyways, my uncle, Steve, is a linguist and is translating a random dialect of Tibetan into English so he can facilitate the translation of bibles, its pretty awe inspiring. So that was good. Anyways, gotta run, I’m sharing laptops with Kelly this evening, and its her turn!

The Beginning..?

So this will be the home of my thoughts and reflections for the next … amount of days.
I decided, just 20 minutes ago, that at night before bed, my wife Kelly and I, should blog together
before calling it a day and reading or sleeping or whatever it is we choose to do at night in bed (harrumph).

To set the stage, and to introduce some topics on which I will be writing. I am currently working for the city of Edmonton for the summer, vegetation manager. Or as well like to say in normal people speak, herbicide sprayer. Now you may think it is a glamorous job full of rock stars and tea parties, but I will assure you, working for the city involves many strenuous hours of sitting around in a truck watching the clock while making sure your boss doesn’t catch you. Strenuous indeed!

I am a second year education major, I intend to teach division II elementary (since the inevitable question everyone asks me is “elementary or secondary” like they actually care. Well, since everyone has been through school, they kind of do care, but only in the “pshh teachers have it so easy, they just get the kids to play and have fun, and then get 2 months off in the summer”. In the future, I will satirically address everyone who says things like that, while ridiculing and educating them at the same time.

Another potential topic will be my married life (yes I’m 26 and married, wow that sure is pretty young to be married (roll eyes) yeah look at those divorce rates (roll eyes and sigh) oh you only dated a month before getting engaged, geez good luck with that (walk away shaking head)) I love my wife, I love my life, and I will never get a divorce, its not even a religious thing, its more of like a life choice thing. You see, she is my very best friend, and we have made a commitment to work out all our problems instead of letting them pile up while we brush them under the carpet, and we don’t keep secrets from each other, and we share everything (even money!). In short, we will be together in this life, and the next. But sometimes, even the perfect marriages have squabbles, even fights; I may digress here about the findings of some of these fights.

I also have a church family (although I don’t really know many people there) in a church called the River. That may get some airplay as Kelly and I try and get involved there. We have pets. One cat (Kitty Witty) and one dog (Chloe) I will probably put some pictures up of them, as they are important parts of our family.

In general, my life right now consists of vacation until the end of this week, then work, then school, repeat. Also, as a former fat man, turned skinny man, turned MMA fighter, turned lover and now returning to a former fat man state, I am in a program called Power 90, where I work out 6 days a week with my lovely and loving wife in our home to a DVD. Now I was pretty hardcore in my younger days, so the initial thought of working out to a DVD kind of turned me off, but then I looked in the mirror and realized I’m like 60lbs overweight, and my pride can take a backseat for a while. The progress and challenges will probably be one of the key features during the next few months while I go through this program.

In short, this will be a journey, nay, an odyssey, of mythical (or not) proportions.
Feel free to tag along.