David Crowder Concert

Crowder is definitely a different looking kind of fellow, but his music is awesome!

Two weekends ago my beautiful bride and I were privileged to go to a David Crowder concert. For those of you who are out of the contemporary Christian music scene Mr. Crowder is one of the most popular artists in this category at the moment. The concert was awesome, opening for Crowder was another band called The Longing and a drama team also performed a few humorous yet spiritual skits that had some real depth to them.
The Crowder Band put forth an awesome worship concert. I just love worshiping with a few thousand people, singing and praising God. I've been lucky enough to see David Crowder on two other occasions and I realized that I've now seen him in three states, Georgia, Tennessee, and most recently Michigan. When I put it that way it sounds like I really get around.

Celebrating mother's day........without any mothers

The look on my face shows how comfortable the harness was.



This wall had a gradual overhang, so the higher you climbed the harder it got.

Same wall as above. Notice, no socks.

On Sunday (Mother's Day) me and some friends went to an indoor rock climbing establishment here in K-zoo. This was pretty much my first time rock climbing except for some brief fooling around sessions at summer camp a few years ago.
A few things struck me throughout the day. First, I'm convinced that a woman designed the rock climbing harness. Let's just say there's virtually no room for the male "equipment" once the device is cinched tightly around both legs and your waist. Second, rental equipment at rock climbing places is so beat up it looks as if it passed through some large mammals digestive system recently. Third, it's depressing to think that enough people enjoy rock climbing in Kalamazoo that an indoor facility can stay in business but the closest real rock climbing is hundreds of miles away. Shouldn't these people realize, "Hey, Kalamazoo sucks, there's nothing really here. Maybe I should move."
Once I was suited up in my raggedy equipment we went through a beginner training course and learned how to not drop your climbing partner, or basically how to not kill your friends. After the lesson we were ready to attack the walls, but first I had to put on the shoes.
As I was putting on the climbing shoes they advised me to go barefoot as it gives a "truer feel". I asked if they cleaned the shoes. They said yes. I still hesitated. These shoes looked like soft dog food that had hardened and was then molded into the shape of a foot and finally colored green. I took off my socks and decided to go for it. As I tied the mismatched, and different length laces, I wondered what kinds of foot fungus I was exposing my toes to.
On my first climb my right big toe was starting to hurt once I reached the top of a relatively simple wall. Once descended I realized my right climbing shoe had a quarter sized hole in the bottom of it. These things really did look like they had been attacked by the flesh-eating disease. I got them taped up however and kept at it.
The afternoon was quite enjoyable. My forearms a day later are quite sore but the fun memories easily take away the pain. I'm afraid I may have enjoyed the experience too much though. I definitely want to go again. It even crossed my mind to get my own equipment. Or at least my own climbing shoes that haven't been mauled by some kind of jungle cat but are being held together by chewing gum and eletrical....er....climbing tape.

University Hockey Career Over

About a month ago I played my last University related hockey game. We lost our opening playoff tilt 1-0 in a shootout. The game was extremely close and I had multiple chances throughout the game to score but the opposing goalie seemed to have my number all night. The worst of it was on a partial break away with 11 seconds left in regulation where I put the puck right into his glove and made him look really good in front of a decent crowd that had come up for the game. After 5 minutes of sudden death sovled nothing I managed to score on my shootout attempt but my teamates both failed to put the biscuit in the basket and we were given an early playoff exit.
The end of the season stats were printed in the University paper at the end of April and I finally managed to get myself a copy. The other picture is from the online student "Cast" as it is called. I mean, just looking at it you could tell I was the captain of the hockey team.........no?

Divine Master?!

This past weekend I attended my graduation from the Seventh Day Adventist Theological Seminary for my Masters of Divinity degree. I had already "graduated" in December but the University doesn't have a December grad. The degree name sounds really quite prestigious but to be honest the program is not really that academic, and it's sad to see how low the quality of some of the students are that make it through.
I'm not sure if officially now I can be considered a "Divine Master". The title seems over the top, especially for those of you who know me well. I've barely mastered making the bed let alone Divine subjects. So yes, you all can still call me Jeff.
I'm slowly accumulating some letters behind my name now, BS, MDiv, I'm looking to eventually add TGIF, ASAP, RSVP, R&R, and R-E-S-P-E-C-T. Those are going to take a while though.

I'm (we're) married!!! (Part 3)

No, Niesha had no idea I was going to dip her.




Sunday morning finally arrived. The big day! The day we had been planning for 7 months. The day we had been stressed about every day for 6 months and 29 days. But besides starting about 30 minutes late, the day was a big success (the mother of the bride managed to get lost on the way to the wedding).
We had prayed for months that it wouldn't rain since Niesha from day one had wanted an outdoor ceremony. We weren't able to have the ceremony on the beach like she had originally wanted to so I desperately wanted the weather to cooperate. We had spent hours and hours searching for an outdoor location and if it rained all that would be for nothing. Well, there was not a cloud in the sky the whole morning. But little did we know we should have been praying for warmth. March 18, 2007 happened to be a record day, record as in the coldest day for March 18th in Orlando's history. The morning low was apparently 42 F, or 6 C and it took a while to warm up. The wedding was at 11:00 am so Niesha and the poor girls shivered through the entire ceremony standing in the shade with the wind blowing past us.
But it was beautiful. And although the place was decorated magnificently everything paled in comparison to my stunning bride over the next four hours.
As many people said, the day was a blur. But I remember laughing a lot. I remember thinking how awesome all the toasts were. My bestman, the maid of honor, my dad, and Niesha's mom all did an incredible job and I wish we had somehow recorded every word that was said. The cake looked amazing. The stories that were told were great memories. It truly was a very special day and we can't thank everyone enough for all their help in making March 18th 2007 one of the greatest days of our life!

I'm (we're) married!!! (Part 2)

So next was the wedding weekend. On Saturday, we had planned a lunch to be able to socialize with friends and family since we expected the wedding day to be a blur. But even with the lunch I felt like I didn't get to talk to very many people, and the ones I did get to talk to seemed more brief than I would have liked.

Saturday evening we returned to the hotel with plans to change and go out to eat with the bridal party. Niesha and her girls went to their room and both key cards wouldn't unlock their door. I took the cards to front desk and they reset them. Again no luck. I returned to the front desk and explained the situation. They would "send a maintenance man up". Would Borat return? We braced ourselves for an extremely high level of incompetence. Borat did not return, but it was......another maintenance man with a language barrier.
He tried his "master card key", and still nothing happened. He informed us that the battery must be dead in the lock system and he would have to open the door manually with the back-up master key. He inserted the key in the lock and turned............and the whole circular lock cylinder just rotated in the door. He tried again. Nothing. He tried his card key again. Nothing. He mumbled some words in broken english. At first all of us in the bridal party were laughing but trying to be discrete about it. But after about 20 minutes the maintenance man asked us, "When is the wedding?" "Tomorrow morning." we replied.
"Oh, so it's not tonight, that's good."
"Why, how long is it going to take for you to get into this room? All the bridesmaid's dresses and the wedding dress are in there?!"
"Well, I have to call some people." he said.

Eventually they got the girls door open a few hours later and had them change rooms. It sounds simple but when girls have laid out their clothes, make-up, bathroom utensils, creams, polishes, cleaners, waxers, shavers, it takes quite a bit of manpower to move them and their stuff a couple doors down.