Yesterday was massive. About nine of us watched all three extended edition Lord of the Rings movies in a row. Pow!

We started at about 10am and finised at 10:40pm, with a few breaks in between discs and films. It was good though. I fell asleep for about 10 minutes in every film making it a little bit more relaxing.

As I was driving home listening to music every lyric seemed to relate to something in the films. I was composing montages from the Lord of the Rings to go with The Joshua Tree.

They are top notch films. I don't know if I'd do it again. I feel like I spent all of yesterday in the dark (I did), but it was good.

Sad Macro, Lovely Micro

I'm on holidays, I'm having a wonderful time, and I'm feeling a little guilty about it. Every time I open my browser SMH is there. It's always showing me a new number. 22,000, 26,000, 30,000, 50,000, 60,000. It's like a Keno jackpot going horribly wrong. There's nothing I can do.

Most of me doesn't want to know what's going on outside my microculture. 60000 people? What can I do with that? Don't tell me about the horror, I can't help. I don't want to see pictures of dead people, I don't want to hear stories of people getting swept out to sea, I'm not useful.

Yesterday morning Mum and I went and saw a film. Before the film we were sitting in a cafe eating breakfast and a woman with her daughter walked in and said the the Barista: "Guess where we were going on Sunday? Phuket. Lucky it didn't happen in a week. We're wondering where we'll go now. We'll get a full refund on our plane tickets."

In the afternoon Rach and I went driving to get her hours up. We drove all the way to Stanwell Park. We parked, bought a Coke and walked to the beach. There were hangliders flying off the cliff above and landing on the beach. The ocean was rough and looking angry. It felt like the water might be trying to tell us all something.

At Community Dinner that night we were all in good spirits. There was the usual laughing and stupid jokes at everyone's expense. The night only got sad when someone brought up the tsunami and we prayed about it. I wanted to move on. We did, desert was very nice.

Impotency sucks, but when I'm not thinking about the rest of the world I'm having a great time. I bought a new cd today, did shopping with Mum, watched DVDs, hung out some washing. If I stopped opening my browser my holidays would be perfect.

When you hear that 22,000 people have died what do you do? I have no idea.

Well, I haven't been a very good blogger lately. Too much has been happening.

I finished my book today and I didn't like the ending. I also didn't really change my mind about it all, but I may read another one by Picoult.

David came home the other night. That was fun. We walked back to the car past security zones, over busy highways and abandoned bridges, it was way cool. We ate pizza in Newtown till late and regaled each other with stories of the past six months.

On Christmas Eve, I got to do the talk at the family service and people were nice to me. I had spent the afternoon building Hannah's birthday present. A pink bike. I sat on the floor surrounded by nuts, bolts, washers and tools. I felt like a Dad building the bike. I decided that I look forward to having kids so I can build bikes and Ikea furniture for them. The pinnacle of fatherhood.

Christmas Day started at my old Church where the new minister bowed down to me and called me a legend. True. I think he was joking, but it was funny to go back and find that I've joined the ranks of all the ex-youth ministers before me.

I got lots of books and gift vouchers this Christmas, yipee.

I had lunch at my cousins house. Christmas night I spent sitting on a couch watching The Panel and Almost Famous. That was a tops movie.

Yesterday I wrote my sermon, and last night I delivered it. I wasn't thrilled in it, but I'm happy it's done. At church I heard a rumour that I had stolen someone's girlfriend. I thought this was funny considering my romantic history. It all turned out to be, well, nothing really, and everyone's friends, so that's nice.

When Church was done, I was on holidays. Many of us went and saw The Incredibles. What a great film. I laughed. Pixar are just the best.

Today I woke up late and went a saw Blade: Trinity with David. That too was a good film. Actually I don't know if I'd say good. It was fun. There was lots of fighting and cool stuff. Guns and chases and the like. The music was cool too.

Tonight I watched John Safran Vs God with Jem and Ryan. Funnies.

So that's my life in dehydrated form. I'm going start reading my next book in about 10 minutes. That'll be fun.

In the space of about 20 minutes my mostly empty week has filled up into a mostly full week. Fantastic.

I went for a drive today to write my sermon for tonight. I needed a place alone where I could talk out loud so my car was the place. I drove for a while north up the freeway and when I got to the end of the sermon I decided to turn around. I took and exit did a u-turn then headed back towards home.

I started my sermon agan and as I drove I noticed things I hadn't noticed on the way there before. I dove over a brige I didn't remember and saw water that looked out of place. It was only when I was 70kms south of Newcastle that I realised that I was still heading north. I turned around properly this time and headed home. It took me a while to get home.

I was reading an article the other day where Dominic Knight (whoever he is) called Christmas "everyone's favourite pagan-made-Christian-made-pagan-again holiday."

It's common knowledge that Christmas was a pagan festival that was appropriated by the Christians thousands of years ago to help the simple folk celebrate Christian things rather than non-Christian things. As far as I can tell from my extensive research Christmas was originally a festival to the Roman god Saturnalia. The festival was to celebrate the solstice (21st December). Jesus wasn't born in December, it was probably around March. But instead of creating a whole new holiday to celebrate the Christians just used an old one. Why build a new house when you can just renovate an old one?

Anyway my thought was, we Christians stand up and declare that the real meaning of Christmas is Jesus birth. It's not about Santa or shopping, it's about the incarnation.

But by that same token Wiccans can stand up and say, the real meaning of Christmas is not Santa and shopping, it's not babies and incarnations, it's the about the Sun and the god that Saturday is named after. It's just as valid, or perhaps more valid than most of the Christian talks that happen in churches and Christmas assemblies all over the western world.

I think the real meaning of Christmas may be that humanity likes to get together, eat food and give presents. We just like to chuck different names and ideas behind it but they're all just an excuse to bring out the best and worst in people.

But don't let me be a spoil sport. I love celebrating Christmas. And I think it's a wonderful excuse to talk about Jesus and God's gift to us. I'll celebrate at the drop of a hat so Jesus' birth is a wonderful excuse for a family get-together.

So Happy Christmas everyone. And when you've forgotten what you ate for lunch today, and you've forgotten what presents you've been given, remember that God's visit to planet Earth is just as wondrous on Christmas Day as it is every other day of the year.

Christmas, Ooo.

I'm procrastinating.

Procrastinating would be great if there were no guilt attached to it. Oh dear now my cd has finished that was my marker for when I should start doing some work. Goodo.

I had a day full of meetings. Meetings, coffees, morning teas and beers. And meetings pretending to be coffees, morning teas and beers.

But I got a lot done. I had lots of discussions. Normally having this many meetings would make me annoyed. But I know I am having this many meetings so I can go on holidays, the hope is sustaining me.

Harry Potter 5 is coming out on July 16th 2005. That'll be fun.

And if you want to hear something funny, listen to the techno version of the National Anthem. Bad, bad, bad. Doesn't make me proud of my heritage, but then again when does the National Anthem ever make me feel patriotic? Play me Jimmy Barnes any day.

Book Thoughts

I started reading My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult on Friday. I was intrigued, because I had heard lots of women talk about her, some rave about her (perhaps only 5 but that seems like a lot), but never once heard a man mention her and she seemed to come out of no where. I was interested as to why this was so. So I've started reading.

I'm eating the book up, it's a very easy read. I'm just under half way through and I really want to keep reading. She's filling my spare moments.

The story of this book is about a girl who has been born as a designer baby to be a genetic match for her older sister who has leukaemia. She was born so she could donate blood, bone marrow, organs, etc to keep her sister alive. The girl decides she's had enough of this and files for medical emancipation from her parents, she wants to be able to make her own decisions about her body. This is effectively signing the death sentence for her older sister.

The book paints a really interesting picture of a family struggling to cope with big problems. I'm really enjoying seeing how well thought out the situation is. None of the characters are black and white, there are no good guys and bad guys. And the ethics of it all are in your face, and heart, the whole time.

On the other hand the book isn't as well written as I would like. She lacks subtlety. There are metaphors strewn through out the book, but they’re easy to find because she makes sure they're at the end of a section of story. There are certain lines of dialogue dripping with subtext which she points out to you by virtually writing in the next line "That contained subtext and the deeper meaning is..." It makes me feel a little stupid. I don't want to be given neon signs to find the hidden treasure. Of course I am stupid, rarely can I read a book and figure out what they're really trying to say ("Animal Farm was about communism? Really?") But I at least like to pretend I can. Stories should be able to stand on their own and get richer with the deeper meaning.

I wanted to get that off my chest because well, it's interesting for me. She sure beats the hell out of Dan Brown, his characters are thinner than the paper they're written on, and everything else is predictable, sensationalist, dull and, well, bad. And she writes better than Clancy, but Clancy writes about spies and tanks so he probably beats her by a smidgen (except for Red Rabbit, which was a poor execution of his own well trodden formula). She beats Grisham who writes to match the price of his books (I got two for $6 but actually got them for free because they priced them wrong in Woolies). She’s not as good as Rowling who doesn’t pretend to be anything she’s not and doesn’t treat her readers like ten year olds. She isn't as good as Courtney, but at least her characters preach less. Tolkien wins hands down, his writing is like eating a rich mango (I would say peach but I don't like peaches) which is exquisite when you eat it and it hangs around, filling your life long after mango is gone; you can still taste it a year after reading it. In my view she also can't touch de Bernières, because he preaches at you for a whole book but you never saw him doing it, and he weaves words into pictures, emotions, characters and stories, leaving you enthralled at both the intricate little bits and the sum total. He un-pretentiously shows you the other half of the English language, and then makes you decide you should go find it for yourself.

So in my completely un-comprehensive list where does she fit?

de Bernières (He’s probably up there on the strength of Captain Corelli’s but the other books are good)
Tolkien
Rowling
Courtney
Picoult
Grisham
Clancy (but he’s more fun)
Brown

There are lots of other people I would love to write about (C.S. Lewis, Chuck Palahniuk, Jeffery Archer, Stephen King, David Gutterson, and probably lots more) but well, I need to go to bed.

Anyway, my verdict is she’s wroth reading (although rarely do I read a book that I regretted reading, The Day After Tomorrow, Tim Allen’s book and anything by Archer are notable exceptions). I don’t quite get why all the women love her so much. I think perhaps because the female characters are well written, better written than the male ones (which is rare, probably because a lot of the popular writers are men), and the male characters fit stereotypes that appeal to women (not to say all the characters are appealing, just the stereotypes).

I say all this only half-way through the book and I could be wrong on everything. I might write again when I finish the book.

I didn’t mean to write this much, I think I’m just having too much fun. Writing about books makes you look high brow and educated. Either that or just a conceited fool.

It's not the end of the world. It never is. Unless of course the world is ending.

Today was going to be my day off. Then I woke up and decided that I had more chance of seeing friends tomorrow, so I decided to make tomorrow my day off. I still got the traditional day off sleep in though.

I went to Chatswood today and had coffee with Matt. He's good value. I went to HMV with $20 gift voucher wandered around and bought nothing. I must have been depressed or something normally I can't avoid wanting to buy half the cd store.

I read my book on the train, and that is always fun.

I reckon Beth is one of the best commenters around. Good on you Beth.

In two days it'll be the longest day of the year. If I was a witch I'd dance naked on a hilltop and boil things in a mini-cauldron that I bought from India Fox.

Today we had our big Christmas carols thing on at Church. It was big. I spent all afternoon doing manly work in the sun. I used a big spanner to take a fence apart and I got to carry heavy boxes around. I sweated a lot and got dehydrated. It did feel good to be working hard though.

I also got to help set up the kindy farm that the brought in for the occasion. I got to carry a lamb, then walk a sheep on a leash. I got to pull out all my "Good Shepherd" jokes. The animals were the best. There was some ducklings that I contemplated adopting. If only you could keep ducklings small and cute. But well, ducks are cool too.

In the evening I dressed up in my costume. It was in a Joseph costume because I played Joseph in the authentic re-enactment of the Christmas story in the playground of the church with Angels wearing nighties and playing keyboards and Shepherds living in a multi-coloured playset. Being Joseph I had to lead Mary on a donkey, a real donkey. That was cool. I became the donkey handler for the night and that really jacked up my feelings of self-importance.

The donkey however had no such illusions of its own self importance with his ability to defecate and urinate where ever and when ever he liked. It just made the whole authentic experience more authentic. I wish I too could have done that in the middle of the play, just for the feeling of freedom that must be.

I didn’t actually have any lines in the play and I didn’t feel like the job was all that hard. I had only been to one hour long rehearsal. After the event lots of people told me I did well as Joseph. I usually replied with “I know”. For those that were being serious it probably sounded arrogant. For those that were being silly it probably sounded as it was meant to. It didn’t occur to me till later that some people may have actually thought that I did well. All I did was lead a donkey and look surprised when there was an angel in my bedroom. No arduous task, but well, it was in front of 300 people so maybe it seemed bigger than it was.

I think I’d be Joseph again next year if I got the same deal, especially if there was a donkey around. I really liked the donkey. His name was Martin. I may name my 5th son Martin in honour of him.

I went to a family picnic today. I don't usually go. This morning Mum asked me what I was doing with my day and told me that she was off to a family picnic. She hadn't asked me and but had some how decided that I would be writing a sermon or something. Feeling very "spur of the moment"-ish I decided to go. I really hoped I wouldn't regret it. I'm always very awkward at family things.

But we arrived and I pretended I was in Youth Minister mode and I did alright. I told myself that everyone didn't hate me so I made conversations and stupid jokes. It was fun in the end. I got lots of comments about how I never turn up to anything. I told them that if they stopped having picnics on Sundays I might come, like today.

I think the point of the picnic is that when I decide that people like me I'm much better at socialising. I already knew that, but it was highlighted again.

It is interesting how your thoughts and feelings late at night, in those places you explore between turning out the light and being caught by sleep, can be so full on, so sure, so intense, but when you wake in the morning they're nothing but a shadow of the feelings they were, like the smell of ciagrettes on your clothes after a long night out. You wake in the morning and the sun has taken away your dreams. Sleep devours the passion and infuses you logic. You can change the world at 3am, but by 7 the world just works its changes on you.

Yesterday I helped my sister pick up a bookshelf for her house. She asked if I could drop it around at Jem's house. I did this. arriving at Jemma’s folded into my car as the bookshelf was so big it encroached well into my driving space.

The drop off was only meant to be about 5 minutes, but it evolved into an hour. That then evolved into a trip to Hornsby to eat lunch which later found its way into a second hand bookstore. I bought Captain Corelli’s Mandolin to lend out to people and The Satanic Verses to read myself. The bookstore smelt, but I liked it. There is something comforting about second hand bookstores, they seem to be in this twilight world, in a literary place between death and resurrection. It holds all the smells, memories and nostalgia that all old books have, but the promise and anticipation of new, undiscovered, un-read books. It’s great.

We then managed to head over to Westfield to do a bit of Christmas shopping where we met my sister after she arrived back from her day’s expedition that began just after we picked up the bookshelf. The drop off had developed into a wonderful little serendipitous affair to fill my day off.

In the evening Ryan came round to watch Return of the King: Extended Edition with me as I had bought it while at the shops. It was tops. I didn’t think the extra footage was as good as the extras in the first two, but it was still fun to see. Any extra footage is good. I maintain that Denethor is the most underwritten, one-dimensional character in the series. Even with the extra scenes he wasn’t all that complex.

Still it is wonderful film. I do love them all to bits.

Oh how the mighty blog world has fallen.

Somedays I notice how socially awkward I get. Like today. Other days I don't. Like yesterday maybe.

Today, apart from moments of feeling rather stupid and relationally gangly, was good. I had lunch and dinner in two restaurants. I did a talk. I said nice things about people. People said nice things to me. I saw Christmas lights.

In the morning I went to a primary school to do the talk for their Christmas assembly. The assembly amused me a little. My talk had a lot of toilet humour which made the kids laugh. I hope they got the point though.

We went out for a staff lunch. Fun too. We met the new staff worker and gave each other presents. It was nice to just relax.

I had a meeting and rang my small group. I also drove to Chatswood to get some videos copied.

Tonight I had a leader's celebration for youth group. I really like all the youth leaders. I think they are all tops. I got to tell all the leaders in my section how I felt about them, which was good. I really enjoyed telling them what I liked about them. Helen did the same with her leaders. Then they said nice things about us. It was very nice. I felt quite loved.

We had dinner out, and that was good. Funnies all round. The night ended with a trip the Christmas lights land. It was good but it still doesn't feel like Christmas. The year is ending soon though. Yeah Baby! I am way more excited about the 27th of December than the 25th.

I've fallen completely and hopelessly in love with myself.

Today I went to "coffee" with two of the guys from my small group. I had a Mixed Berry Smoothie. I didn't finish it so I took it to my car, put it in the cup holder and forgot about it.

Tonight I went out with my family for my parent's 30th Wedding anniversary. It was very nice, very romantic. After dinner Jo, Hannah and I took them to a 5-star hotel where we had booked them a room secretly. I moved the smoothie out of my car and into Jo's so that Mum and Dad could have that car for the morning. I put the smoothie on the front seat reminding myself not to forget it was there.

After seeing Mum and Dad into the hotel and checking out their room (I've never seen a bigger bed) we took Hannah back to the car. I put Hannah in her seat and reminded myself that the smoothie was on the front seat. Between doing up Hannah's seat belt and getting in the front I forgot about the smoothie and managed to sit on it. I got mixed berry all over my bum. It was quite funny and mostly disgusting.

On arriving home I have cleaned the car seat and my clothes are in the wash. I was going to soak them in Napisan but there are no spare buckets so a bit of Preen will just have to do.

Napisan will get rid of any stain. It's the best. I wouldn't look nearly as spiffy as I do if it wasn't for the old Napisan.

Life happens without me asking it to sometimes.

On Saturday night Jem and I went to see Team America. That was an interesting film. There was lots of very funny stuff and lots of offensive stuff. I very much enjoyed watching the film except when it got too crude, like in the sex scene and the speech at the end.

After the film though, I decided I liked it less. The film made fun of everyone. When it started I thought it might be a good satire. It was just cynical in the end. It basically said that everyone who is taking part in the debate about the War on Terror is wrong. They never proposed that there might be a right way to go about things, just that everyone was an idiot. That was my biggest problem with the film.

After the film, we spotted Hornsby RSL with dancing people inside. it looked like a fun place to be. It was a fun place to be. We left about 1:20am at that time when you start to realise the implications of your impulsive decisions on your following day at work.

The following day at work was tiring as I have commented before. For drama we just played in the park and drank Coke. My ideal drama time. The other end of the day was fun too. I had a good time at Maccas. Holidays always makes McDonald's a much sillier place to be after church and that suits me just fine.

I spent all day today working on videos and fidling around with banks. Tonight I went out with Ryan and Lesley to watch Finding Neverland. That was a very nice movie. Johnny Depp was tops as always and it made me think. Goodness movies make me think a lot these days.

We ended the night at Keith and Stella's for pancakes with Jem, Mil and Martin around too. Good times.

I'm really looking forward to the holidays. I had a sleep on my office floor for almost an hour today. My brain isn't functioning at work nearly as well as it did these days. I need my four weeks.

My belief in open community costs me a lot in sms-es (how do you write the plural to sms?). Whenever I decide to organise a movie watching (or similar event) I send out masses of sms. I always have the decision of deciding who to invite or who not to. I can usually tell the people who will come and who won't but I think it's good to invite anyone. Sometimes people surprise you. There are some people that you wonder if you should invite, or if perhaps you aren't good enough friends with them to invite them to go out with you. In the end I usually end up inviting them because I'd rather offend someone for being too inclusive than offend someone for being too exclusive.

I have just returned from the shops. I managed to buy 6 Christmas presents. I'm not sure who I'm going to give one of them to, so I may just keep it for myself. But the rest have homes and I'm looking forward to giving them.

I like Christmas. I really like giving people things I've decided. That is the best part of Christmas. Now I don't get disappointed if I don't get what I want, because really, I don't want anything, I'm quite content with the mass of material possessions that I already have. But I do enjoy adding to others treasure on earth. It's no disappointing when you can't get them something they want.

But yay for Christmas I say. Yay for being able to spend lots of money and not feel too guilty.

Speaking of guilt and greed (which also starts with G) this was a good article in SMH yesterday. Interestingly it was written by Matt Wade who used to work as the photo and video man for Tear Australia. If you read the article you can tell.

"I am not Pinocchio. The truth will make us free. We overcome by looking it in the eyes." - The Doctor
Captain Correli's Mandolin, Luis de Bernieres

Countries that refuse US immunity 'face aid cuts' - SMH

That is really dodgy. America is going to cut aid to countries who support the International Criminal Court but don't give Americans immunity. I don't know much about the whole thing, but in theory the ICC seems like a good idea. America just seems to be bullying the poorer countries in the world into removing America's accountability to anyone but themselves. Grrr.

Canberra and Back in a Day

So today we went to Canberra. What fun.

I picked up Jem from Hornsby at 9:20 or so this morning and drove to pick up Rach. We were going to Canberra so Rach could get her learners hours up. We managed to do that quite successfully. Leaving Rach's house 20 minutes late we headed off in search of our nation's capital at no more than 80kms an hour. This was all against the advice of our worried parents.

The trip down was fun. We had silly conversation. Many times silly conversations lead to one of us taking mock offence, but then that just seems to be the way conversations go these days. Jem and I sung a lot of John Mayer quite badly.

I ate breakfast in Berrima. It is a town full of jam, craft and old people. Our presence in the town probably brought the average age of the people there down about 50 years.

From Berrima it was straight on to Canberra. What a fine (and circular) place Canberra is. On arriving in the city we drove straight to Parliament House where we got security checked were then allowed to sit in on part of a session of parliament. It was mighty good fun. We all got to see out local members. We say Latham, Peter Grarrett, Crean, Bronwyn Bishop, and all sorts of other celebrities. I'm not quite sure what they were all nattering about, but their insults put a smile on our faces.

We left when Phillip Ruddock started a long blah about some mismangaged Labor lease agreement. We explored the building a bit looking at the paintings and historic documents (Is that the real Magna Carta? And if it is, what is it doing in Australia?).

From there is was a trip to Ali Baba. He fed us well.

We headed home, and had only just got out of Canberra, to Lake George to be precise, when we got caught in a storm. A big storm. We couldn't see out the front of the car windscreen so Rach pulled over and practiced using her hazard lights. This seemed like the best idea as most of the other cars on the road seemed to be doing the same. Soon, in a scenic spot by the Lake George (that was currently missing behind the pouring rain) the hail came. Big bits, as big as the top of my thumb perhaps. I know that doesn't sound big, but they look big. It was most exciting.

Once the rain eased we headed for home once more, and were soon in the sunshine again, with no memory of the deluge behind us.

Homeward bound was a little quieter, and tireder. Rach got progressively sicker with a cold that she had probably picked up from the Berrima locals. Jem, well, she was a good passenger, keeping up her end of the conversation nicely and encouraging us to sing carols.

Once back near Sydney, we dropped Jem off at a farm that Ryan is currently house sitting. My sister and Martin were there too. It was a nice farm although, seeing as we arrived at around 9pm I couldn't see much of it.

I drove home the last leg and we talked about the alphabet and how news travels. Twas good.

Now I have arrived home. It is good to be back in the land which is mine. I've just eaten some butter chicken from a frozen meal and it's better than I thought it'd be.

It's funny all my blog posts recently have been short. Not many remarkable things have happened in my life recently. I've spent lots of money.

I didn't wear shoes till 6:30pm tonight, it was great. I went to a dinner party thing at Louise's tonight. That was fun. We spent the whole night sitting down so if you wanted to talk to someone you had to change seats. It was a bit like musical chairs but there was no music, and people were a lot more polite. I did like my time there, the food was good and the people were better.

Last night Jo, Ewan and I went and saw Garden State. It was a very funny film. Very well made and not very Hollywood. There had been a lot of thought put into it.

I think Natalie Portman is cool. If I knew her I might have a crush on her.

Jo and I invited almost half the church between us and only Ewan turned up. Oh well. Next time we'll get more friends.

I did a talk today. 4 times.

We had scripture seminars at the high school. I didn't like my talk very much, and it's hard talking to a hostile crowd. But I got through.

I really enjoyed hanging out with the young people though. The great thing about high schools are that they are full of young people and young people are tops. Even the ones that don't like you because you're a judgmental Christian.

I went to Campbell's Cash and Carry today. Boy that was fun. A big warehouse full of boxes full of stuff. Stuff that I want to buy. Crates of Coke, big boxes of Chocolate, huge amounts of cereal, buckets of cooking fat, walls of toilet paper. Oh so beautiful, so fun. I'm sure that heaven will have some resemblance to Campbell's Cash and Carry.

Last night I said I would play Joseph in the church nativity play. Ahh! Scary. I get to lead a donkey around the church property though, that'll be fun.

Oi! Life makes me real sleepy.

Last night people became Christians at our Term Celebration, that was cool. I got to talk to one kid who I've known for two years and he decided that Jesus' death meant that he should respond. I was so excited I couldn't stop grinning stupidly at him. Poor guy he was probably scared about what he had got himself into.

Today I had plans to get Tuesday's scripture seminars ready but I got distracted by things at work. Most interestingly a website full of testimonies from people about why they stopped being Christians. Very worth reading, very challenging.

Skipping back in time, yesterday I got to go to Chatswood and buy an Air Hockey table. Fun it was. I took it back to church and put it together with other people from the youth group. I love spanners, I got to spanner that table (tighten bolts) and I felt like a handy man.

At the end of the night we had to put the table away. We needed to get it through a gate on the church property but it was too big. We ended up having to pass it over the fence. That was a good fun manly moment. We had 5 guys passing an air hockey table over the top of a two metre (or so) high fence. Grunt!

Tomorrow I sleep in...

...and then do all the rest of it.

Ahh flipity flob.

Life doesn't always go how you expect it to. Which is both a good thing and a bad one. Sometimes things just come out of the blue.

In other news, tonight I had fun. After setting up for the term celebration at church, Helen, Kaye and I went off to the movies together. We arrived about an hour and a half early for our movie so we needed to kill some time. We went to the arcade and played car racing games, which were very fun. And then created a makeshift picnic at Coles which we consumed in the deserted food court of Warringah Mall. It was a smashingly fun occasion.

With happy bellies (at least mine was) we headed off to the cinema to watch Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason. I thought it was fun to watch, while nothing much more than that, it was worthwhile. And I got to see the Episode III
trailer. Yeah Baby! How excited am I? Very.

Now I'm going to bed because tomorrow I'm buying the youth ministry an air hockey table.

Cathy asked me to link to her on my blog, so here is the link.

Cathy is in my youth group and she calls me "Tomothy".

I've had a lot of conversations over the past two days about marriage and how Christian girls should dress. It's been very interesting but I'm feeling almost talked out.

My youth leader coffees have continued, I had a water with Sally at her house this afternoon, followed by a really long Vienna Chocolate with Beck. Matt messaged Beck to tell me I'm very attractive which was interesting since I had been just saying that if I was a girl I would have a crush on him. Funny that.

My meetings with my leaders recently have been a lot more about other things than about youth ministry. I've had fun though. I'm now just hoping I asked all the good questions.

Mum and Jo (sister) also talked to me about the usual subjects. I had a long discussion with Mum this morning about marriage and how she feels about being The Brady Bunch Mum. It was interesting to hear her views, but it always is.

Tomorrow I am going to college for my last class of the year. We're going to the movies. I can't afford that, but I'm sure I'll scrape by somehow.

Well, hmm. Jo and I had a meeting today. We went to the pub. We started at the President at 5pm and ended our time together at the Blue Gum at 11pm. We spent six hours either at pubs or between them. And in that time I managed to have three drinks. I'm an alcoholic I tell you. 3 drinks in 6 hours.

Anyway, we covered many topics and it was all good fun. At the Blue Gum when we met up with everyone else we had a long discussion on girl's clothing, and what their obligation is to guys to help them keep their eyes up. It was interesting.

I did other things today too. All of them involved being hot. Except for staff meeting which was held in air conditioned comfort.

Profound.