highlights and lowlights

Well, it’s been over a month since my last post. A lot has happened over that time. The following are some highlights and lowlights:

I was thinking the other day…actually, I do think every day, but on this particular day I was thinking the following; If you were having a reunion of all your high school friends (whether friends from high school, or church), and you could bring in any band you wanted (money and location were no object), who would it be? After giving it some thought, I actually decided that it was a really great question. Genius in fact. And so I open it up to the general public. Would love to hear your responses and also the reasoning behind them. As for me, I’m actually going to go with Genesis. Genesis is nowhere near my favourite band but, when it comes to the 80’s, they rank right up there with some of the most hits of any band. They’re also listener friendly meaning that I don’t really know anybody who wasn’t into them, at least somewhat in the 80’s. I think they’d be a good generic band that would cross all the different personalities represented among my friends.

I read last week that the ultimate sign of fitness is in how many push ups you can do. Apparently there is no other form of exercise that tests out so many different areas of your body. A man my age should be able to do at least 29 push ups properly. I can’t. I’m working on it.

A Canadian colleague of mine became so enraged over my “Oh Canada” post that I was actually reported to the higher ups! I’m not kidding. It actually took several phone calls to convince my own supervisor that it was all tongue in cheek and written specifically to take a jab at my plethora of Canadian friends. Sheesh. I love the internet, but I keep forgetting that sarcasm doesn’t translate very easily in the written word.

For decades it’s been cool…no, downright SHEIK to be a fan of the lovable loser, i.e. the Cubs or Redsox. My question is this; when does it become cool to be a fan of the Pittsburgh Pirates? They’ve completely sucked for nearly fifteen years with absolutely no hope of getting better on the horizon. Am I cool or what?

I’ve never wanted to see the U.S. boycott an Olympics more than I do right now. Throw the UK in there too. The truth is that China should have never been granted the Olympics. I don’t know what the Olympic committee was thinking. And, for those not paying attention, it isn’t just about Tibet. China is notorious for human rights violations. Tibet just happens to be the one group of people, whose rights China violates, that they can’t keep quiet. Honestly, we’ve invaded countries for much less than China is getting away with. Have some courage politicians. Step up, do the right thing, and send a message, not only to China, but to the committee who thought it was ok to send the Olympics to China.

Today, while visiting one of our churches in London, a car alarm went off outside. It went off forever. It was as if the world was announcing the fact that they were, in fact, outside, and challenging us to get out of our bubble and to come out where they were. We tried to pray through it, but were absolutely distracted. As always, those doses of reality always make a church service seem a little more real to me.

The countdown has begun to what my household is referring to as the Epic Fritssanic Adventure. “Fritssanic stands for France, Italy, Swittzerland, and Germany. In two weeks we leave for a European road trip which will have us taking a train from London to Dover, a ferry from Dover to Calais, and then a car from Calais to Florence. On the way there we’ll drive across France, making a two day stop in Geneva, and then finally arriving in Florence, Italy where we’ll spend a week taking in sights like Venice, Pompeii and, of course, Florence. On the way back we’ll take a Northern route which will take us through Switzerland and Germany. I don’t know what I’m most excited about, the time off, eating Italian food for a week, seeing Switzerland and Germany, or simply the opportunity to drive. I desperately miss driving.

I guess that’s about it for now. I’ve actually been writing these random thoughts out over the course of this weekend. I just sat down to finish this up and ran across another story of Tibet and the Chinese crackdown. What a bunch of evil bullies.