He He, The Virgin at Coogee.

In the end I got the programs done. I posted them right on six o'clock. Very long day. Never saw Villawood.

If I read that as the beginning of a book, I'd think "Nope".

But I saw my computer today, running. I think "Yep".

It's a hot night tonight and Sydney stayed up late. Not partying, just sitting. Being too hot to sleep and not wanting to do anything else.

If I rejigged that a bit I could use it as a first line of a novel.

Hot January nights, and the city stays up late, each house the same as the next, some lights on, some not. But no one's sleeping, just waiting, waiting for some cool relief, or morning light, which ever comes first. It was on nights like this that you could find Ellen Walker out the back of her one bedroom terrace flat, lying on her deck chair, drinking white wine, wearing little, but no-one could see her anyway.

As Ellen lay amongst the hot air, she would try and feel her neighbours. What were they doing while they couldn't sleep? What were they hoping to dream of when sleep finally come? After growing up on a property 5 hours west of anywhere, having neighbours, for Ellen, was a novelty that never quite wore off.

I'm still at work and the darn things haven't printed. I was meant to meet Jo in Hornsby 15 minutes ago but I can't leave yet. Things aren't quite working.

The Hills ariticle that I was talking about is now on the web, here, for a short time only.

Blogger wasn't working last night when I got on to blog. I didn't so much yesterday though. I spent about four hours working on the program for the youth group. And figuring out the name because I wasn't a real fan of the name we came up with. But in the end I got it done.

Post that, I watched the first three episodes of Buffy on DVD. It's an interesting show. I wouldn't say world class, but it's alright. At the moment I'm at work waiting for Paint Shop Pro to download so I can finish this program. I have to print it out and post it off. After that, I'll see what life has in store for me. I might go to Villawood today and visit some of our guests.

Robert got me "John Safron's Musical Jamboree" on DVD for Christmas. It was sitting on the doorstep when I got up this morning. Looks good. I'll probably watch some of that today.

Well I went to Enfield today (this waking day, not this actual day). I got almost all my computer. Wow. Very exciting. A computer for me, to edit on.

I also had a meeting today to plan the term at the youth group this year. It was very long. But planning meetings are. I'm starting to get a bit of a feel for the place. We also had to make up a new name for the youth group. I thought that Vache (I think that's how you spell it) which is French for Cow was a good name, but I thought cows were not quite what one wanted to be naming their youth group after, golden calf and all. Plus when you pronouce it right it rhymes with thrush.

I've just been reading the stuff about the UN report that's going to come out tomorrow. It says that at the moment it doesn't look like Iraq is hiding any weapons. America is saying that it is.

Damn.

I don't like where all this is heading. I don't like people going to war. I don't think a war should happen with UN backing, and I especially don't think a war should happen without. But US is going, perhaps they have already gone. I think they are just waiting for a good excuse to come along, something to justify the decision that they have already made. Lucky us, John Howard is following close behind.

Did you know that John Howard is from the Bradfield electorate? That's just near where I live, and he's sending us off to war with Iraq. Isn't that strange? I wonder if John Howard knows where Westfield Hornsby is.

I went and saw Bowling for Columbine tonight. That was a cool film.

We had a discussion on the way home about if Michael Moore should have interviewed Chalton Heston at the end of the film and various other things about the interview. I think I decided that Chalton Heston wasn't the person to be chasing in the film if Michael Moore's point was that America's high rate of gun crime was not a result of high gun ownership but the culture of fear that fed to Americans.

The film made me want to be a missionary to the USA so I could teach them about Jesus. But I think that will wear off soon.

All up it was a good film. I think guns are bad, and guns and fear are worse.

David and I ordered almost all my computer today, very exciting. We only have to order the capture card now. It's costing me lots of money, and David in all his genius is going to build it for me. Yay.

I'm very excited. Phat computer for me!

There was a really dodgy article in the Good Weekend on Saturday about Hillsong Church. I personally am not a big fan of the church, but the article was terrible. It was rude and they quoted most people, if not everyone, out of context. It really just slammed Hills and didn't tell us anything good about them at all.

I am considering writing to the GW and telling them that I think it was crap. But I probably won't.

Now I am very tired.

After going to the new church this morning, twice, I was asked by a family if I had anywhere to go for lunch. I say I didn't. So I was told I was going with the family and their son would lend me some swimmers.

Ahhh! Swimming is very scary.

When I arrived at their house I was told the swimmers were being got for me, I should get changed in the bathroom, put on some sunscreen and meet everyone at the pool because they were already there.

Boy, did I reflect light today. I'm quite white at parts. It was on the "don't look at me side of things". And no-one ever asked me if I wanted a swim.

That said, I had a lovely time. The swimming was good and the family is very friendly. It was a bit of rampant hospitality that I haven't experienced much off before. It was cool. I'm learning to accept hospitality. I'm hoping to learn how to offer it too. I think that my new church is a very hospitible church.

I practiced my sermon as I drove home, and got lots of funny looks.

I had my last service at St Pete's tonight. That was sad. It's been a good church. It was said leaving, specially the young people. They were the coolest.

I showed "Where the Streets Have No Name" from Elevation tonight too. That was cool, because I like U2. I didn't really have any reason to be showing it, but I think it's the tops. It's meant to be about heaven, so I guess it's alright. Although I'm not really sure that we go to heaven when we die. I'm thinking about it. I think maybe we go to the new Earth. But then it could be on the new Earth that the streets have no name.

I preached too. I finally figured out what I was going to say. I think God was the mastermind behind that one. I preached loosely on 1 John 4. I jumped around a bit and used the passage a little I guess, but I talked about many different Bible things. And non-Bible things. I told stories of my time last year as well as talking about what I thanked God for and telling people what I wanted to leave them with. Lots of people said good things about it. But as I said, I would say that was God's doing, because I wasn't doing very well.

I did think about sticking the sermon on my blog, but I don't think I will now. I'll give it to those who ask though.

It was very strange saying Good-bye to people. I don't think leaving will sink in until in a few months it occurs to me that I haven't been to St Pete's for a while.

On the other hand, it was already feeling a bit foreign to me. So I don't know.

I don't find the show degrading. What I find degrading is when you're not being watched - if guys turn their back to you or keep talking or talk on the phone while you're dancing. I hate it, but it comes with the territory and you can't show with your face and you have to go 'Oh, i just love how you're ignoring me'.

- Bobbi the Stripper in SMH today

Found here

It's my sister Jo's birthday today.

Happy Birthday Jo.

Last night I watched Chicago. That was a cool film. I want to make a musical. So much fun I think. Perhaps I will one day.

Yesterday I took three of the leaders of the youth group out to lunch. I took them to a pokey little restaurant in Hornsby. There was supposed to be a guy coming with us but he couldn't make it, so there were only three girls.

Two of them met me at the church and the third one we went to pick up. When we pulled up at the house I thought, "I wonder if we should beep." Then I thought I should ask if we should beep. But just before I asked I changed my mind and decided to ask if we should honk instead. Unfortunatly I got mixed up and asked the girls "Should we bonk?"

At least they thought it was funny.

I missed posting yesterday. It was another very long day.

I moved into my office yesterday, sort of. It's in a mess because the phone lines are getting put in and there are shelves and desks and rubbish everywhere. I'll probably try and fix it up a little tomorrow. But it's very cool. I'm very excited. I love having an office, I've never had one of them before. And I got a new wheely chair too. Wow. So much fun.

I'm reading a commentry on John at the moment and I found this bit concerning John 3:29 that I thought was a little funny.

Unlike his disciples the Baptist is filled with joy, the joy of a best man at a wedding. The friend of the bridegroom was to wait outside the bridal chamber for the groom's indication that the marriage had been consummated in sexual intercourse. "The Talmud evidences an indelicate, but probably ancient, custom whereby the bridegroom would signify a successful attempt at intercourse by pronouncing the Shema (`Hear, O Israel . . . !')" (Derrett 1970:230; cf. Jeremias 1967b:1101). This image fits the present context, for as the shout of the bridegroom signifies the new family is off and running, so Jesus' activity indicates his ministry has begun successfully.

You can find the whole thing here

I just thought the phrase "the shout of the bridegroom signifies the new family is off and running" was funny, and the idea of having the best man waiting to hear if the marriage had been consummated. I think might be a little embarrassing, personally.

Last night I had a spider crisis.

I headed off for bed at around 1:30am. When I arrived at the bathroom, there was a big hunstman on the doorframe. The spider had been living in the bathroom previously, but he seemed to be making a move for my room. Anyway, I slowly and carfully entered the bathroom, inching my way in on the opposite of the door way. I was quite lucky I didn't get attacked then, lucky he didn't jump at my throat and rip out my windpipe.

In the bathroom, I got ready, admired myself in the mirror, did my teeth, then wiped my mouth on my towel. When I put my towel down, which is near the door, the spider got a fright and scuttled away. That would have been a good thing except he scuttled right onto my door.

Now what was I going to do? I certainly wasn't going to use my door. Went and turned on a light so I could get a better look. Then I sat down in a chair and prepared to played the waiting game. The seige of my room had begun. I was going to stave the spider away if I had to.

While sitting in the chair I considered all the options:
Catching the spider with a jar and piece of cardboard - Too scary, not safe for my hand
Scaring the spider with something so it would run away - Not safe, the spider may run under my door and into my room
Bringing in the dog so she can eat it - As much as I hate spiders I don't like to kill them, not unless they are funnel-webs and extreamly likely to to kill you (as opposed to this spider which was only most likely to kill me)
Sleeping on the couch - the best option, but I was only wearing shorts and t-shirt and thought I might get cold

There didn't seem to be any options.

I got up and paced. From certian positions in the room, I could see the spiders eyes glinting at me, like two little beads of evil. When I sat back down in the chair I thought to myself, "If only there was a girl around that I wanted to impress, this whole thing would have been over a lot quicker."

Then I had a brain wave!

I carefully moved back into the bathroom and got myself the broom and mop. From a mildly safe distance of about one and a half metres away from my door, I used the broom and mop to push the dogs bed towards my door. When it got near my door the spider got scared and run up the door, away from the bed. I pushed the bed into place at the bottom of my door, blocking the way for the spider to enter my room by going under the door. Then I placed a cushion under next to the bed to futher block the escape route. After that I used my bravery and courage to use the broom to herd the spider back to the door frame of the bathroom, and then ultimately back into the bathroom itself. The spider was back where it came from, and I was safe and only half an hour late for bed.

When I did settle down for bed I place a rug at the bottom of my door just incase the spider came back. That done I exhaustedly headed for bed. But instead of being able to fall peacefully asleep, I found the Robert had cunningly placed my bin inside my doona cover.

It's a hard life for a spider hunter.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm self righteous?

Sometimes I don't need to wonder.

If I were American I'd vote for this guy probably because he doesn't like George W. I don't particularly like George W, vote for me too.

Since I'm Australian, I don't know who to vote for. I know many people not to vote for though.

I wonder if Philip would like to come over for dinner? I'd give him a Microeasy Cheese Burger. I like them.

Phil's site has a photo album it's full of good pictures, including these weapons found in the detention centres. Notice that all the scissors are open? A sure sign that they are weapons. If they were closed would they be cutting impliments? If they searched my house they would probably find few weapons too. We have scissors (although they're closed), we have screw drivers, pipes, cigarette lighters, knives. Next time they lock me in my house I'm all set for a good riot. Lucky I'm not Afgani or I'd be rioting right now!

I just lost volley ball. I get bored at volley ball. After we are three sets down and we can't win the game my attention starts to wander.

Tonight I got invited to go out with some people from church, I would like to go because they are nice people, but there is no car here. It's nice to be invited out. Perhaps when the car comes home I will go. Perhaps.

After that we saw The Quiet American. That was a damn fine film. I think I would like to watch it again on DVD, maybe buy it. Good stuff.

Macca's followed, and a conversation with a homeless guy who was showing me his hip hop lyrics which were all about George Bush, Tony Blair, Saddam, drugs, alcohol and the police. We talked about hip hop and his wallet. He was a friendly chap and I made a donation, which he was asking for.

We caught the bus home (Deanna, Matt, Tim and I) and watched the appalling Whatever It Takes at Tim's house.

Now I am home.

That's the 21st for you.

Well today...

Sitting around at the beginning. I tried to work on my "sermon" (I hate calling them sermons, they sound to formal, and like they'll be full of my wisdom or something) but it's not coming together. I'll have to wait for God's inspiration on this one. Seeing as it's the last time I'm at my old church, I want to say thank you and show the people how much I love 'em. And I want to encourage people to work hard for Christ. I have no idea how I'll go about that, or if I will at all. I'll have to see how God leads.

Perhaps I will stick it on my blog when I'm done. I probably won't though.

After sitting around I went out to go see a film with some of the people from Mission. We were meeting at Town Hall steps at 5:30 so I went in early and sat under a tree in Hyde Park and read my book. That was marvellous. I often forget how nice it is to sit in a park in the middle of the city and read.

It's nice to read anywhere, and particularly nice to read in a park. But a park in the city, in my opinion, is the best. I think it's something about having somewhere quiet, somewhere natural, somewhere where you can fall asleep, in the middle of all the buildings, people and noise. The contrast of what goes on around the park makes the park all the nicer.

So that's what I did.

When I made it to Town Hall steps we were met by a dude asking for money. I'm always bad in those situations. I know how I feel about it ethically, but I never get around to doing it. Clare, forunately, decided to give the man some money, which gave me the courage to do also.

I am often tempted to say I won't give people money because I figure they'll go and spend it on drugs. And perhaps they will, but I figure that's not our decision to make. The Bible says we should give to anyone who asks and I figure that means anyone. By not giving someone money when they ask because we figure that they'll spend it on drugs is judging them. And judging them purely by their appearance. And I think that's wrong. I think we should trust them because love trusts. If they spend their money on drugs that's their choice not ours and I don't think we have the right to make that choice for them.

But that said, I don't believe in supporting a drug habbit either. I don't think we should hold on to our money when asked for it out of fear or greed. But if we hold onto it out of genuine love and respect for the person who is asking then, we have a whole other ball game. In that case we need to go beyond giving the person our money, but giving them what's needed. And that is more than buying them a meal because you think they might be lying to you when they ask for money.

Really I don't know how to handle people on the street who ask me for money. I rarely have the courage to give the person what they ask for so I think I'd need a whole lot more courage to give them what they need.

The 21st went un-posted.

Although at the moment this feels like the 21st.

Ryan and Robert are watching a film called Bully. I started watching it, but I decided to stop. Of what I saw the characters spent half the film naked. I figured that I didn't want to watch it anymore and my blog had a little less nudity.

If I didn't just have one of the busiest weeks in my history, then I can't remember my busiest. Does that make sense? I think I have a lot of catching up to do. I'll try and get it all down. Pehaps I'll even be able to do it.

This will probably be long an un-interesting, just so you know.

Wednesday

I think I talked about Wednesday, early Thursday morning. And on Wednesday actually so I guess it's not really worth talking about. But I do have to say that on Wednesday I really didn't want go to the festival. I was dreading it. I thought I'd turn up and no-one would talk to me, or worse they'd all be mean to me and throw things at me. But lucky for me they didn't.

Thursday

I didn't do any blogging at all on Thursday. At least after 1am I didn't. That was an interesting day. I arrived at the festival at around 9:15am and hung around with no friends till around 9:30 when I went to a lecture on the Power of the Holy Spirit. I thought that would be interesting, but it all went over my head. There was a lot of stuff that was assumed knowledge I think and so I didn't get much out of it.

At lunch time Ewan and I ran a Sumo wrestling competition with tire inner tubes. That was interesting. Ewan was cool, he hung out with me most of the time. If he hadn't been there I would have been a bit of a loner. I think it was very kind of Ewan, my beach mission buddy, to hang out with me.

Jo turned up half way through the day to go festivaling. It was good to have her around. Her and I hung out together at the main meeting at night.

We saw a band called "Freefall" who I thought were good. I had a friend in the band and she said they had a terrible day. I couldn't tell. She also introduced me to two of her friends then left me with them. That was a little strange. We made small talk for about 15 minutes, then when we ran out of things to talk about they talked to each other and other friends while I stood by silently for another 15 minutes or so trying to find an appropriate time to leave. I'm not one of those people who is good at just walking away mid-conversation.

Jo and I went home around 9:30 because I had an very large urge to spend time on the toilet. The toilets at the festival had no toilets seats and often a bit of spillage and thus were not toilets I felt like using for the lengthier toilet experiences.

That night we prayed together as a house hold. It was nice. Dad suggested that we all pray out loud at the same time. I like the idea, I've never done it with the fam before. It was a little strange. Dad said it might make us less self-concious but I found it made me more. But it was good to try. I have the feeling it would be better, for humans, in bigger groups. But I don't know.

Friday

A lot like Thurday really, but longer. And better seminars. I went to one on Christian Ethics which was pretty cool. Ewan and I's sumo stuff didn't really happen that day though.

I also hosted a Karaoke night as I said. That was difficult and no-one laughed at my jokes, and I felt like an idiot. But it was still a good experience. I didn't have to sing any Karaoke too which was very nice.

During the Main meeting the main festival organiser talked and he was a very funny bloke. He controlled the audience very well. He would have us one moment in hysterics and the next making his point. It was a good sermon too. Very funny but with good stuff about the character of God and his love for us. It's always nice to know that God loves you.

I went home at around 12:30 and I felt a little tired.

Saturday

Bathurst day. After a late start, Graham and I managed to head off at around 10:45. I hadn't eaten any breakfast because we ran out of milk. I think that's just as well because if there had been milk I probably would have eather Farmland Frooty Rings for breakfast. As it turned out I has Maccas in Lithgow. Infinately better.

Graham and I arrived at Angus' house and proceeded to take photo's of ourself, print them, stick them in a photo frame, wrap the photo frame and Ben Harper cd as they were the wedding present and make a card out of a Post-it note, folded over. Then off we headed into the west.

We stopped at Lithgow for breakfast at around 1pm. It was 38.5 according to the McWeather computer.

Once in Bathurst we explored for a bit. We headed first for the grooms house. That was fun. I've never met a groom on the day of his wedding before. We also drove Mt Panorama and explored the delights of Bathurst's shopping district (mostly closed due to it being Saturday I think). We got spruced up for the wedding in a unit a friend had hired for the weekend and we headed to the Cathedral.

It was a nice wedding. All Prayer Book and hymns. I spent most of the service thinking about all the exciting things I'm going to do at my wedding (lots of crazy videos, and a minister dressed as Elvis, but I've heard that my wife-to-be* probably won't let me) and feeling extreamly scared because these people getting married are almost my age. Am I that old? Not really. But I'm Christian and male and Christians get married young.

We went to the reception afterwards and that was cool. There were goldfish on the table and I met the Bishop of Bathurst and he had a very strong handshake. There were speeches. They went for a very long time. It was a very nice wedding. There was dancing. I didn't want to participate but I got forcibly placed on the dance floor. Carried I tell you. Very bad. I'll have nightmares.

We left at 11:42. We got back to Hornsby at 2:53 or so. Graham and I had a long conversation and I asked him lots of tricky apologetics questions about Jesus. I hope I didn't destroy his faith. I don't think I did. I didn't fall asleep either.

Sunday

Yesterday, up early. At St Ives Showground at 9am to pack up the festival. I was a little tired. I carried lots of chairs. Hundreds of chairs. I was quite sick of chairs. I folded up tent and packed and un-packed trucks. I drank lots and ate little. I drove people to stations and put on sunscreen. It was a good day. I have sore arms now. But I had fun. Funny that. Perhaps it was a bonding experience with all the other packer-uppers.

At night I got have my welcoming service. The whole church prayed for me and layed hands on me. I got interviewed and made a fool of my self, and people laughed at my jokes. That was good too. It's a very friendly church. We all went out for Maccas afterwards so I could be welcomed. I met lots of people, learnt lots of names and only one person got annoyed at me for not looking them in the eyes the whole time.

Today

I slept in, sat around and tried to begin working on what I'm going to say on Sunday. And now I'm here.

* I don't have one of them yet, but she's probably out there, unless I'm going to marry someone 20 years younger than me or not marry anyone at all.

I have been neglecting this blog. Partly because my computer eats poo. And it gets viruses, probably from the poo eating.

I have been at this festival for the past few days. Very Charo tonight. Lots of people crying, and getting healed and all that. It was good. I also had to host a Karaoke night. But alas I can't say much as I have to go to Bathurst tomorrow and I must sleep.

Goodbye.

I had a hot chocolate tonight. That was nice.

I wasn't planning on blogging, but I figure, what the hey.

The festival was pretty cool. I knew 2 people there enough to hang out with them. I met a few more. I hope my new shorts made a good impression on them. The praise session was really good. I wasn't really "in the moment" but the music was good and I enjoyed being there. When you're in a crowd it doesn't really matter if you don't know anyone. The preaching was good too. The guy preached on the need to centre our worship on Jesus, and have our focus on the cross, rather than on ourselves. It was good stuff. Everyone was saying it was hard core. It didn't seem hard core to me. It seemed good, solid stuff, but I've heard most of his other sermons are funny. That could be cool. I like funny sermons.

I that that when Counting Crows sing "her kindness bangs a gong" in Anna Begins, it's a reference to 1 Corinthians 13. But I could be wrong.

I think Robert's planning on paying me out for my last three posts of self indulgence. The way I see it, blogging is self indulgent so it dosen't really make a difference.

I once sent an e-mail with this subject: Christmas is a time for vomiting. Lucky it's not Christmas.

And I sent this once too:

US Aids bin Laden's Escape
Unconfirmed reports suggest that Osama bin Laden may be using the US air strikes against Afghanistan to fuel his plans to escape. Bin Laden is said to be using un-exploded cluster bombs and other munitions dropped by the US and Britain to fuel the rocket that he and his followers have built. The rocket is to be used so that Osama and a select few can fly to Mars and create the perfect society. They are now looking for beautiful women to join him, if you or anyone you know fits that description you can apply by e-mailing Osama at phat_osama_69@hotmail.com. AFP

Good on me.

Tom's Top 3 Bands:

1. U2
2. Counting Crows

That's it.

There are some website I go to often. Here they are:

1. Dark Horizons Gives me all me film news.
2. Sydney Morning Herald Good start up page, but I get the real paper in the morning so I only read a little bit of stuff there
3. Bible Gateway Good for looking up Bible passages.
4. St George Internet Banking I always need to know how little I own.
5. WebStat Tells me how many people have read my blog, not usually all that many people.
And who could for get:
6. Google You know what that's for.

I'm going to a festival tonight for my second day of work. I'm going on Thursday and Friday too. I have to meet lots of new people. I don't think I like meeting new people. I don't think I'm very impressive. If first impressions last they'll say "He doesn't talk much". Plus I have to remember names. I think there is a person called Pete.

Robert is paying me out at the moment because I don't like going to the beach. He reckons that if I'm going to be a youth minister on the beaches, I should surf and if I don't they'll fire me. Jesus didn't surf. He didn't even play guitar. Then again there weren't any youth around in His day, but that's no excuse for not surfing.

I broke my McDonalds fast. Mother wanted me to take Hannah out and I was hungry. I thought that 2 weeks was good going anyway

I was in the change room today, trying on my shorts and after a while the shop lady knocks on the door and asks "Are you alright with your shorts in there, hon?"

I'm like "Yeah".

Perhaps I should have been excited because she called me "hon" (she probably had a crush on me) but I was too busy being annoyed that she didn't think I would know how to put on a pair of shorts.

I wonder if she ever asks the question and gets a negative response.

"I'm just having a little trouble getting my legs through the holes. And I can't figure out this button thing."

That was just a little joke of mine.

I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow. It's either on at 9am or 12pm. I'm not sure. I have to ring up in the morning and find out. I'm hoping for a 12pm so I can go back to bed. That would be nice. Hopefully the doctor will be able to fix my toe. I have had an in-grown toe nail for over 2 years now. I actually kinda used to it. I guess it's like being a paraplegic. You get used to it. Next time I see a paraplegic I'm going to go up to them and say "I know how you feel man, I understand."

I wrote a really long update today with every film I saw in 2002 up until August. I was going to do the whole of 2002 but the computer crashed. Not an unusual event. Quite regular actually. There should be another crash coming up soon, so don't be suprised if I stop mid-sente

$118.11 now. Just for an update.

Bank Account now at $405.51. Paid my phone bill.

My cheque cleared today (American's spell cheque, check, they're so quaint) and I have $516.62 in my bank account. I figure that by the end of the day there won't be as much.

There is also no milk so I am going to have to have my breakfast at Westfield. Maccas maybe. Although as of today I have officially been two weeks without any McDonalds. I have been more than that because it was before Christmas that I last at Maccas, but I figure seeing as it is now two weeks into the year I can say this is officially the two week mark. Problem is that Maccas and KFC are the only two places with eftpos and I don't have any cash. Gosh. How hard life is in these modern times.

I just watched Platoon. That wasn't a particularly nice film.

I think war is stupid. I don't want Australia to go to war. If I got called up for war, which doesn't seem likely at this stage, I think I would go to jail. Or try and find something that helps the people who have been affected by the war, but doesn't help the war. Working with refugees, can you do that in the army?

I was wondering if it would be possible for there to be a peace keeping force that effectively kept peace without the use of guns. Peace for peace's sake not peace because of the threat of violence. If one country invaded another, could you send thousands of people in to say "Hey, stop it, that's not nice"? A non-violent army that stands in the way and stuff. Very Gandhi like. Probably people would get pissed off at them and shoot them, but then that happens to regular armies as well.

I read an article the other day about a group of people who are going over to Iraq to stand in the way of the US when they try and bomb the country. I think that's kinda cool. They expect to die though, and I don't think that's cool.

"I helped hijack an airplane. I helped blow up a nightclub. So what if it gets 11 miles to the gallon. I gave money to a terrorist training camp in a foreign country. It makes me feel safe. I helped our enemies develop weapons of mass destruction. What if I need to go off-road? Everyone has one. I helped teach kids around the world to hate America. I like to sit up high. I sent our soldiers off to war. Everyone has one. My life, my SUV. I don't even know how many miles it gets to the gallon."

WHAT IS YOUR SUV DOING TO OUR NATIONAL SECURITY?
DETROIT, AMERICA NEEDS HYBRID CARS NOW.

www.thedetroitproject.com

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It didn't matter before when people bought petrol from dodgy countries because all they did was abuse the rights of their citizens. Now that those countries are planning to abuse the rights of American citizens, now we should worry.

I have realised that the church with the yellow walls only has one room that's yellow, but the outside is kinda yellow brick. So I guess it's still the church with the yellow walls. Soon though I figure it will just be church, or work, or whatever else I decide is an appropriate title for the place.

I spent a bit of time there today. Having chats, meeting people, asking questions. I'm looking forward to getting into it, but there are so many new people to meet. I had an iced chocolate instead of a milkshake. I had seen Robert's iced chocolate at CityExtra and I was inspired to get my own. So I did.

Right now I'm very hungry because I haven't eaten any lunch yet, I'm hoping dinner arrives soon. There isn't much in this house that's snack worthy.

I'm in the process of cleaning my room. It's making me sneeze, and I think I keep a lot more paper than I need to.

I'm going to bed now. I have a new job to start in the morning. I'm going out for a milkshake and a doughnut.

We did go to City Extra before the train trip and Ryan and I had a very long conversation about how to relate to non-repentant sinners. At the start at least. By the end we were discussing whether God created lions to eat antelope.

On the way home last night we met a drunk man. He liked to talk to us and he was a bit rude. Every now and again he'd make an inappropriate comment. I'm not quite sure how one is meant to react to inappropriate comments by drunk people. But I think I just tried not to give the comments to much importance.

At one stage the man went and sat behind Robert and Ryan. When he was there I found it difficult to hear what he was saying. I was finding the situation a little amusing and when he mad a comment I couldn't hear, I had a bit of a chuckle to myself because I thought it was all a little strange. I knew that the man had made some kind of joke, so I didn't think laughing would be all that much of a problem. But after the joke Ryan and Robert weren't laughing. They weren't even seeming polite. And then the drunk man pointed at me and said "And this guys laughing about it!".

Then I thought, "Oops, I wonder what I just laughed at."

It turns out it was an extremely inappropriate comment which Ryan and Robert weren't even going to repeat. I wasn't quite sure what was going on after that. I felt like I'd just committed some terrible social wrong without meaning to. Perhaps I did. It was a very strange situation and after that I wasn't quite sure what to do.

I went to Jazz in the Domain last night and I have decided that women should not wear hipsters, and g-strings and sit down, it makes an unpleasant sight for those behind them.

Robert wrote this in his blog:
"Tom complained today that i dont update my blog enough, but you see my theiry is that you cant rsuh true literary splendour, i mean sure i could write in here every day about the conversation i had with my mother, i could tell you about my emails in my invox and winge to you that i have a headache, but i'm not going for that.
its all about quality...quality is the essence of life, quality is the essence of self well being, quality is what brings us together."

I now only have 5 e-mails in my inbox to reply to, and two of them are from the same person. How excited am I.

I have headache too.

Moose Factory is on the Southern most bit of Hudson Bay, for all those who were wondering.

I saw Catch Me If You Can today. It wasn't half bad. I wouldn't watch it too many times. But it was a nice film. Tom Hanks didn't annoy me too much, and Leo didn't either. It made me laugh and I ate some Subway afterwards. I feel it wasn't a bad way to spend a Friday.

I thought to myself in the shower today "I think I should write on my blog about the place in Canada called Moose Factory." But now that I think about it, it's not really worth writing about, even on my blog.

I'm going to see my first movie of 2003 today. I think I've taken a little long to get around to it.

The 16 people, minus 1 who was forgotten and 2 who never existed, came over. Mum said it went well, so I think it must have. The 13 people made a lot of washing up. We had a really long table in the dining/lounge/computer/storage room, made up of our usual table and three card tables. They call us the masters of class. Everyone did a lot of talking, and there was a beetroot dish that makes your pee go red that I avoided. One of my Aunties stayed behind and did the washing up in her green gloves. She's a lovely lady.

I can smell me from here.

We have a bunch of relis coming over tonight for my Auntie's birthday. My mother has left Jo and I in charge of getting the house ready. I have the feeling that I am not quite up to the job. My idea of a house ready for 16 guests is probably a lot different from my mothers. For me all you need is Nacho Cheese Doritos, lots of Coke and 16 seats around the dvd player.

I just went to the bank and deposited a cheque. How good does that feel?

I just calculated my Body Mass Index as 21.9. I have no-idea what that means but I'm sure it probably stands for well built and really good looking.

To be honest I think the answer to that last question is, we shouldn't do it where it's more comfortable because when you flush the toilet it bubbles up and threatens to overflow, and if that happened you would have the problem of what to do with the turd that is sitting on your bathroom floor. If of course you go outside there isn't much that a nice hole and a few leaves won't fix. But if you are outside you may have the neighbours taking a peek, so you have an important decision to make, turd on floor or turd on show. We live in tricky times.

I think my family gets a little frustrated that my blog doesn't really talk about important things. I don't talk about people much.

That is true. This blog is like my brain. I guess that's why it's scatty. I write what's in my head.

But if it means anything Mum, The Two Towers was a very cool film. It made me laugh, and Peter Jackson is a dude. I guess the essence of the film wasn't exactly funny, but I enjoyed myself. It was very cool. And I had a good time going with my friends and family. I have good friends and family. And Jo was very good that night. A loving sister who was very selfless. Hooray for her.

There you go Mum.

Our sewerage is broken. All our poo and wee and toilet paper is bubbling up in the front yard so we have been instructed to do our business in the backyard. Now that I think about it that seems a little silly to me. I could do a wizz in the toilet or on a tree, and either way it's going to end up in our yard so why not do it where it's more comfortable?

"Marge, the rains are 'ere!"

It's been cloudy all day, and now that the sun comes out, it starts raining. Hmm.

Last night I asked: "September 11 was on the 11th wasn't it?"

People who live in glass houses shouldn't
throw stones, but people who live in stone
houses can pretty much throw whatever they want.

(E.G. Merten)

I got that at in my Ruminations list.

I got to go to Westfield today. It's good to be back.

I like digging holes.

When we washed up on mission we listened, to Scripture Rock, dc Talk, U2 and Fat Boy Slim. I liked three of them.

While we were playing poison ball at beach games one day, I was wearing my sunglasses, at one point, due to something exceptional that I did, I turned to a fellow Beach Missioner and said "I'm the man!"

To which a kid playing near-by quickly replied "No you're not four-eyes!"

I wonder if I have lots of interesting stories to relate from Beach Mission? Hmm. I don't think so.

I didn't really want to be there. I wanted to be here, at home. But I went. I went because I felt that's where God wanted me to be. And I think I was right, that's where God wanted me. I didn't stop wanting to go home, but I learnt, I was challenged, and I hung out with lots of lovely people (Team and campers) for 11 days. I think it was worth being there.

Will I go next year? Perhaps. We'll see where the good Lord leads me.

The funny thing about mission, and the weekend away before it, was that I managed to pick up many women. And I never meant to. By the end of the weekend away I had a 5 year old son, a wife and a girlfriend. By the end of mission, I still had a five year old son, I had an ex-wife and a fiancée (is that how one spells it?). It's funny because I try not to have pretend relationships. I'm not sure what it is, but even though they are silly, I try and avoid them. Perhaps it is because most jokes have some basis in reality, either in exaggeration, contrast, or devaluation (Some are just plain absurd though). And I guess I don't like to pick up pretend girlfriends, wives, or kids, incase the implications of the joke, the undertones, are not what is intended. In the same way I don't like to joke about not liking a person. Sometimes I will but I like to try and make sure people can tell where the joke is coming from.

I've never really put any of this in words before but I guess I have a desire to have jokes that build others up.

All that said, I don't think my "relationships" on Beach Mission were a problem. I think they came off ok, and that's good.

We had a good car trip home. I drove most of the way and we were leaking oil. At one point just near Hexam there was a car full of young males that drove past us and looked shocked and pointed at the front of our car, like there was something wrong with it. Knowing that the Tim's Volvo was not the best, we got a little worry that the engine might be on fire, or had ceased to exist or something, but we decided they were probably just hooligans trying to trick us.

After checking the car at the Oak, we decided they were just hooligans. We decided this partly because we couldn't find the dipstick so checking the oil would be a bit hard, so the car was probably fine.

We had much conversation on the way home, we didn't say too much until Tim asked me about my love life, and then there was much conversation. People laughed at me a lot, but it was a good topic of conversation. I got to ask Rosie about when everyone used to tease me about liking her and if she found out. She said she did and we had a good laugh.

Ho Ho Ho.

Oh to be home. How happy am I? Happy, I am.

I have listened to new cd, am listening to more new cd. I may watch new dvd. Tonight I will sleep in new sheets.

I have eaten dinner, and talked to my mother. Very nice.

I'm home.

I have to meet some people soon to have a picnic. Remind me not to get scollops from the place with dodgy scollops.

Did I say I cool got the job at the church with the yellow walls? I did.

Last night I stayed up late having very important theological discussions about if foot washing should be a sacrament and if Jesus had pre-fall or post-fall flesh. Very important stuff.

We solved all the issues and none at all.

There are some aboriginal kids up here and they all call me "Mr Tom French Boy". They are friendly, but they don't like being taken home.

Sometimes it's just "French Boy".

Other kids think I'm thirty years old.

So may I tell you what it's like on mission? Pehaps? Ok I will.

I may not get very far though. I may get distracted.

Mission is full. Very full. We get up at at least 7:45am then do stuff till about 9:30pm. I like the 6:30 get up though so I can have a shower which makes me feel like I'm actually awake. I'm not really, but I like to pretend.

My favourite part of the day is between 1:45 and 2:45, we get to have sleep. How much do I love sleep?

About a lot.

Yeah.

Anys, the kids are cool. We run stuff in the afternoons for a bunch of kids in years 3-6 in school. Some of them don't like to behave, but I'm hard core discipline man. Grrr.

"Err, excuse me, um, could you, um, please stop strangling your friend, if that's ok? Ok?"

Something like that. I have made kids move and kicked kids out of my group. If I was a kid I'd be scared of me.

Actually the kid that I kicked out of my discussion group asked me over for dinner. How cool is that? I had a great time. We went to the chocolate wheel (now there's a bit of culture I've never discovered before) and had steak sandwiches. And we played pool, and table tennis, and horseshoe throwing, and we talked about movies. I had a good time. I didn't tell his parents the gospel. Perhaps God will slap me.

I have to tell the story of Jesus calming the storm tomorrow. Or is it today? I think it's today.

I had a really good plan, but one of the other leaders stole my idea. Really, they said "I stole that idea from you Tom". So now I have to decide to keep going the way I had planned and risk looking un-original, or I can think of something new. Oh the stresses of life on the coast.

I run the cess pit. I am a very important person. Perhaps, second only to the team leaders.

Perhaps not, too.

I just checked my e-mails. I had 20 e-mails, and how many of them were personal? 1
How many of those personal e-mails were asking me for money? 1

Don't I feel loved?

I have finally got the chance to get on the net. I'm sitting in the back of an Art and Craft store that just happens to have three computers connected to the net at the back of it. It's a little strange. Who would have thought that a Craft store would have the net. I guess that's how things go in the sticks.

Perhaps I shouldn't say that, I have a local next to me.