Aging....

So what's the deal with balding? I mean, who wants to have a chrome dome? Well not me. Sure Zachary and Kevin may like the look, but I for one am against it when it comes to my head. Anyway, after much thought, I have come to the conclusion that having longer hair just is not for me. So here is a before and after so you can see the sweet new do.

I also had my first day at Pizza Hut today. I'm a little bummed because I'd like to be working forty hours a week, but it seems like initially until I prove myself, I'm stuck with 20 to 30 hours a week. Even the manager was saying that it's great that I'm available to work so many hours, so hopefully that means he will give me more hours soon. Other than that awesomeness, Pizza Hut is a fun place to work. Right now I'm learning how to make the pizzas and do odd jobs around the place, but hopefully after that I'll be able to start doing deliveries, or maybe waiting tables. Either way really would be nice getting a little extra cash. So if you could pray that I'll catch on and show this manager guy that I'm worth keeping around. And if your praying anyway, we'd appreciate a little word to God about our house selling. You know, priorities. Pizza, house, God. Or should it be God, house then pizza. Okay, I'm sure it's God first then you can decided between the other two.

Hope you like the sweet photos. And the Pizza Hut talk. Oh yeah, the best part of the job is that I get free Dr Pepper, free pizza while I'm working and 50% off for Katie and I and whoever comes with me when I'm not working. Good times. I mean who needs one of those fancy jobs where you get stock options and bonuses. Oh wait.

Welcome to Pizza Hut, can I take your order?

Yes! I work for Pizza Hut. And who said I don't have ambition. Making pizzas is the place to be. Career progression is easy. Before you know it, I'll go from cooking the pizzas to actually be wiping down tables and maybe even taking orders. Sweet! Now, I know y'all are probably pretty jealous, so I've got the hook up if you need a job. I'll put in a good word for any of you, well any except maybe Zach. He's too cool for Pizza Hut.

In other news, it's rainy here.

Please pray with us again!

Tomorrow from 10-11 am a family is scheduled to take a look at our house. This process is weird because we don't have to do anything except pray, and yet it is so draining. However, praying is also the only thing we can do that will actually do any good, so pray we shall. We thank y'all so much for praying with us.

More posts to follow, someday.

¡Que bonita!

As many others in this family have already done, I will post a picture of my first niece. She is the cutest little thing on this planet. It has been great holding little Emily and I am glad to be her uncle. Here is a picture that I'm sure has been seen a million times, but I just have to put it up here.

People these days...

I was just reading an article on CNN, here you go, and I just can't believe some people.

News flash, Pizza Hut and teachers are causing the child obesity rate to sky rocket in the United States. We should all thank the left-wing saviors for bringing this to our attention. After twenty long years, we can all sleep at night because light has been shone upon the evils of these pizzamongers. Shame on those teachers for trying to motivate their students to read. Bribing those innocent young minds into extending their vocabulary and teaching them that reading is fun. Shame to all principals and teachers for partnering up with those pizza tossing crazies.
And by no means is the reason for all the fat kids in America to be blamed on the parents of said children. By being a parent in no way means being responsible for the health and welfare of your child. In fact, a bill was just passed that gives children the right to divorce themselves from their parents whenever they feel like it. For instance, when parents discipline a child, divorce 'em. Mom tells you not to write on walls with finger paint, can 'em. Dad tells you you're grounded because you broke then neighbor's car window, take him to court.

Am I taking this a bit far? Maybe. Do I think incentive programs are unhealthy to kids? Maybe, if the kid has slow metabolism and only reads or plays video games all day. Are left wing liberals taking things too far. Yes.

I just want to know why common sense is so hard to find when dealing with politicians and other "public" servants?

New Post

This past Friday I started feeling sick. I have this horrible cough and my sinuses are all jacked up, and then this morning my voice sounds like a bullfrog. I know. It's weird. Every time I try to talk you start feeling like you're in the swamp. Anyway. To go along with this lingering cold, if that's what you want to call it, I told some of the guys from lifegroup that I'd meet them at Jim's aka an even cheaper form of Denny's. I get up early, get ready and head out. My voice was horrible this morning, but I figured like yesterday, the frog thing would eventually go away. Well not so much. I get done with the guys and go back home to get ready for work, just hoping I'll feel better. Blah, blah, blah more rambling, drive to work, clock in an hour passes, now we are caught up. I just keep coughing all over the place, my voice is jacked up, so I go and talk to the supervisor and let her know that I'm sick. I explained that I knew it was my first week on the floor and that I was horrendously sorry for having to go home sick, but you know, for the good of everyone else I should not stick around and spread my germs. With the look I got and the snide remark from her, I should have stuck around and coughed all day in her direction. Eventually I spoke to the head manager and she let me go. She even switched around me schedule so I can make up my hours on my scheduled day off(Thursday). Long story, not so short, I really hope I am better by tomorrow so I don't get fired from this sweet temp job. I mean really.
OK, so in other news, did y'all catch the Academy Awards last night? You didn't? Nah, me either. But you'd think they were a big deal, considering even the talk news guys were going off about it. I mean really?

I Passed!

It's been a long hard road. Stress, fatigue and worry have racked my mind for a grueling week. I have endured listening to more unprofessional conversations and sad ghetto stories to last at least 1 lifetime, and maybe an eternity. Yet through it all I buckled down and passed the excruciatingly difficult test to become a brand new temporary ILD customer service representative. I have never in my life felt more successful or challenged. What a happy day!
On a side note I'm thinking to myself, How long can I keep up this sarcastic tone?
Well it's over. Now I will just say that I have one full week of work and then we get to come/go see Z&B&E! I haven't been this stoked since.......well....... I don't know. Maybe since moving back to the motherland. Anyway, I'm stoked and that about it.






This is lamp. I love lamp.

To be a working bum

I went to work. It was not fun. It was work. What did I expect? Hilarity, excitement, a good time had by all? Crazy!

So what else do you want to know? The West won the NBA All Star game. Charles Barkley beat the old referee. I still can't stand Dwayne Wade or LeBron James. I wish I actually still golfed. The Dallas Mavericks are still the best team in recent history. I live in Texas. So does the maker of the best roast in all time history. I really love my family. It's not cold outside. Although I wish I was cold, but night skiing at Shasta. My niece is due in mere days, hopefully. Being late though in this case would be okay with me, probably not so much for her mom. I love you anyway Marla. Bean my wife, is still the coolest person I know. And the most studly.

Not sure what other random thoughts may come out of my brain, but maybe I'll make that my new theme of my blog. Oh the randomness that would ensue.

Stinkin Titles

Really. I mean, who really needs a title. At some point I am going to run out of titles to begin my blog. And today is the day.
So I got another temp job. I'm very very excited about this one. It should actually be the best job in the history of the "American Dream". There should be an advertisement for immigrants. Hey you, no the other guy, Hey, Come to America and you can have this sweet job. No more back breaking work. No more callouses, no more early mornings. Yeah, come answer the telephone and we will pay you money. Sound to good to be true? It isn't, yes folks this is the American Dream.

Okay, okay, I'm being just a bit sarcastic, but what can you do. I have to leave soon, so maybe I'll post some more about my day after I have my day.

Oh yeah, we're back from Dallas. It was fun. I ate tons of roast. Nanny is the bombdiggity. Yup you heard it here first. BOMBDIGGITY.

Kayla and her dang sandwiches

Or should I just say, I'm hungry. This past Sunday we went to Firehouse Subs with some homies from church. I had this corned beef and pastrami sandwich, something to do with New York. I can't remember exactly the name but New York and (insert Homer Simpson hmmm gooooood line here). Anyway, instead of enjoying a tasty sandwich, I shall cook up one of creations finest pizzas. Delivery you ask? Nope, and it's not Digiorno either. Freschetta, Red Baron, Tombstone? Nope, none of the above. Oh Totinos you ask? Nope. Have you got it now? Yes, I have stepped down the ladder to everyone's favorite, Jeno's. Oh man, my stomach is turning..... uh growling for the scrumpiousness of the best 79 cent pizza on the planet. Only five minutes until it's ready.

Oh and could you tell, I'm bored and jobless again. I just realized that my posts are most insightful and wise when I'm unemployed. Ok that joke would only be funny if my blog actually was insightful and wise at other times. Riiigghhtt. So anyway, I'm going to go eat my pizza, hopefully talk to some folks about getting a job and then probably do absolutely nothing.

You talkin' to me?

Anybody watch the Pro Bowl? Yeah, me either. It seems that back in the day All Star games were cool, and now, not so much. For me, it used to be that all us friends from the neighborhood would throw and Super Bowl party with tons of bulk candy from Giant and then a Pro Bowl party the next weekend. And I'd always root for the NFC because that's who the 49ers belong to. And now, my niners stink so there's no shot at the Super Bowl and seeing as I'm only a fair weather fan, I haven't followed the niners since Steve Young retired, there's no point in watching the Pro Bowl. Man that was a ridiculously long sentence.
Anyway. Am I the only one that thinks the Pro Bowl is useless? Ok, now tell me who watches the NBA All Star game? Seeing how I find that the NBA has gone down hill ever since Larry Bird and Jordan retired I don't really care about watching the All Star game. That and all the new players seems to have egos entirely too large for how good they are, or not good. I mean, they are obviously talented as they are in the NBA, but until they play for ten or more seasons with good averages consistently, they need to settle down. LeBron, Carmello, Dwayne "Flash" Wade, ring any bells. That's enough ranting for now, considering the majority of folks that read this blog don't watch sports.... You can just tell me how incredibly studly I am and how you wish you could grow a sweet mullet like me, what!?

I'm out of work... again

So today, my boss Ande told us the great news that Aetna would be cancelling the rest of our contract, so we would be let go today instead of Friday. WHOOPEE..... or not so much. I called the temp agency yesterday to start hooking me up, but they said they don't have anything presently. What a surprise. Luis, one of the guys I worked with at Aetna, said his agency has some openings with AT&T, so I'm gonna try to hook that up tomorrow.
In other news if you didn't see American Idol tonight you missed the most hilarious moment all season. If I can find a clip I'll have to post it on here.
And for the record I would like to say that the Dallas Mavericks are the best team in the NBA still and the Phoenix Suns are slipping. And to think Josh Howard didn't make it to the All-Star game. Appalling.

What's it been, two, three days?

Although I have not posted in some time, it seems I have no real excuse as to why. Then again, eh, what can you do? So life has been living, and time keeps on ticking, so basically all must be well. I really don't know why I'm posting as I have nothing to say, but since I tend to ramble anyway, I guess I'll continue. My job ends Friday the 9th, if the rumors are true. One of those he told her and she told me, but he told her not to tell but I'm opening my big mouth anyway because I like to feel like I'm back in high school, rumors. Anyway, I guess I'll ask the boss, then again he's the one that supposedly started the whole rumor, so maybe he'll whisper to me the answer and I can included in the whole cloak and dagger ordeal.
As you can see I'm about tired of this job. It's been fun and I've learned a lot, but when you look at it, I'm ready to move and I wish we could just go. Seriously why is God always making us wait on Him? But seriously, I'm ready to move.

Alright, okay, so I am trying to wait on God and stay faithful to the praying for His will, but it's hard and I'm weak, but He makes me strong, so in the long run I'll be better off no matter how long selling this house takes if I've got the right attitude.

On a totally or mostly separate note, I was thinking at work today, yeah yeah, about holding my new niece and how awesome it's going to be to see her. I'm so stoked!

Guns, hunting and guitars

So this past weekend I had the opportunity to go to Scott's dad's ranch. As you read in Bean's blog, Scott is our lifegroup leader. Anyway.......
We headed to the ranch friday night which is about thirty miles south and east of San Antonio. It was very exciting as I haven't shot a gun except for an M16 in the past six years. And I only shot the M16 once for qualifying, so it's not like I got to go out and mess around with it. So Carl brought his 12 gauge and two handguns, one baby desert eagle .45 and a stubby glock .40. Scott had his hand guns down there as well. He had a Colt .45 1911, and a Taurus .40 and tons of rifles and shotguns. With all the fire power how could it not be fun. Long story short the shooting was great. Oh, and to go along with the shooting, the ranch is also chockablock with feeders, so the deer are plentiful and fairly large. There were also hogs, havalinas, turkey, rabbits, and many other birds and wildlife. To get to the point I shot a five pointer. He should have been a six, but somehow one of his center points were broken off. The best part of this whole deal is that there is a full time ranch hand named Tito, so after shoot the buck all we had to do is hang it up, and Tito did the gutting and whatnot.
We didn't really do much playing as Scott forgot his guitar. What a surprise. So everyone intermittently played mine, but that's about it.
Alright, so there you go. It wasn't Disneyland or anything, but I still had a good time.

An apology.

For some stinking reason a pop-up was launching after you would bring up my website. That is quite annoying. I took out the sweet picture at the bottom of the suzuki gsx-r and I took out the music from filelodge, and that seemed to have worked. Not sure what the dealyo, but now we're all good. A big apology to Zachary as he was the only big mouth to post a comment about it. I will go as far as say you will be shot my friend. Just so NSA doesn't bring me in for questioning, I will be shooting you with an airsoft gun with plasitc bb bullets. out!

I scoff, kahhhhh

I don't know what I'm scoffing about, but hey.

As you all have either talked to us or seen on Katie's blog, we are moving back to Redding. Tomorrow I have a briefing to figure out all the details about when to get packed up and some other information that wee need to know. I'm excited to get the ball rolling, but I also am not sure when to even make a pack out date as we haven't sold our house yet. We've given this whole decision and process to God, so I will trust Him to work it out.
I am also missing some work to go to the briefing, so I will have to make it up at the end of the day. I'm not very excited about that because the traffic was already bad today. I'm hoping it was just the fact that San Antonio drivers are bad at driving in the rain, but we shall see.

On another note, my fingers still hurt from where my father-in-law shot me. I've got three circle shaped wounds on my hands, a good mark on my left arm and a few other minor bb wounds. And thanks to my brother-in-law Caleb, I have to wear my headset at an awkward angle so as not to hurt my ear from where he shot me. All said and done though we had a great weekend. Hopefully we can get together in February and have another go at it.

Work and whatnot

Today was the first day of being "fully" trained. I am raising my hand for help about twenty five percent of the time still, so the whole fully trained is not really true. I really like doing customer service, so the job is pretty good. That and actually getting to stick to the rules is good. It seemed like in the Air Force as long as someone outranked you they could get you to do anything even if it broke the rules. So I am glad that a company makes rules and actually goes by them. Anyway, it's been fun, but we have only been averaging about twelve calls per person each day. Or about a call every half hour or more. It's pretty sad, but they keep telling me that I'll be wishing we only had a few calls after we are swamped in January. I somewhat doubt it, but oh well.

So, Christmas was good here. I got a new sweet coffee maker and a Mavs jersey. I got other stuff too, but what more can you ask for in life that is better than coffee and being a Mavericks fan. I don't know. We still get to have a Christmas time though with Old man Walker, aka Paj, aka D. Keith Walker and the rest of the fam, and Nanny. Don't forget Nanny. Well, ok she's part of the fam too, but you know what I mean.

Basically other than my shift getting switch from 10 am to 6:30pm to 8:30am to 5pm, life is good. How was y'alls Christmas's's's's'es'sses. For the record, I LOVE YOU BEAN.

Check out the new song!

And Merry day before Christmas Eve!

100

So it has taken me entirely too long to reach this many posts. There have been numerous pointless boring blogs, probably like this one is going to be, and many others that were just boring or pointless, but hey.

For this monumental blog I want to share with you the greatest moments of the past two minutes.
1. I reached 100 posts on blogger. Woohoo.

Okay that is all. Like I said pointless and/or boring. What can I say, I warned you.

Pharmacy something rather...

Today I showed up to the Aetna building and took the elevator to the fifth floor, then I was locked out. We hadn't been given our employee badges yet so I stood there in the hallway looking surely like a big sack of pitifulness. Maybe that's not the right word... helpless, sad, like a reverse fishbowl. Everyone on the inside staring at the weirdly moving dude outside of the bowl. I don't know.
Work was good though. It's not as high class as bean's job, but it's a decent enough place, and it's not the military, so it's all good. My supervisor is a pretty young looking guy that has only been with the company for nine months. He's apparently one of those movers and shakers. Anyway, the job seems easy enough, once we get trained that is. And it must be easy, as they told us they were only giving us the easy calls. So it must be easy, eh? And to top it all off, my supervisor doesn't like the Spurs either, so I think I like him even more. Way too go buddy.
I also found out that it's business caj......but if you want you can pay $5 to some "fun fund" and wear jeans too. Actually the first month is free, so as far as my contract is concerned I will only need to pay $5. Since I can wear jeans, I'm rather stoked because then I can ride my motorcycle to work somedays. Good times, good times.

So it's for real

Today was a nice day, we got to finish painting our bedroom, and now I get to look forward to starting a new job. I went by on Saturday to find out where exactly it is, so I won't get lost on the big day. I found out I also have to go by the temp agency and sign some more paperwork before I start working so I'll have a little extra stuff tomorrow. It's weird that I haven't worked in two months. How crazy is that?

Anyway, life is good, as we found out today at church. A very deep sermon to say the least. Anyway, I think there's a link to our church if you want to hear the message, or maybe it will take a week or so for them to get it up onto the webpage.

Have a good week and I'll let you know how the job is tomorrow or the next day.

Last day of freedom

Today is my last day to be free from "The Man". It's quite a bummer, but then again making money is not. I need to take my car in to get the oil and some other stuff done. I figure why not, I'm not working and when else will I be able to take it in.

I stepped away, and now I don't remember what exactly I was going to say for the rest of the post, but oh well.

So y'all are having a hard time posting comments. To remedy this problem I recommend going to your templated, click inside of the html and then press command A. Then open a word document and pust Command V. Save that and then update to Beta Blogger. After you update if you lose anything go back to your word document and command A again and command V into the template. Problem solved.

Man I can be ever so helpful at times.
Later

Only four more days

It's weird, when I didn't have a job I was tired of staying home and wished I could be at work. Now that my first day is fast approaching, I am kinda of bumming that I don't just get to stay home and paint and hang out. Oh well. Life is always greener..... Or should I say, The grass is greener at American Funds. Nevermind.

So it's late and the Mavericks are straining to maintain the lead again. I don't think I can watch anymore.

Update from last post, I have ridden my bike the two past days. I'm loving it. It's great riding the motorcycle. Even if all I did was go to the store again.

I should have taken a picture, if I had a working camera, of my bike yesterday. Picture a bright yellow ratchet tie down strapped to an ice chest to the back of a bike. It was so ghetto white trash looking. But it served its purpose and I was stoked to ride instead of driving. Someday I'll show you people. Maybe I'll bust out bean's old film camera.

It's nice weather

The forecast for today is 74º. It's a little disappointing as it is winter and almost Christmas. The weather should be in the thirties or forties, but hey, what can you do. Anyway, I'm pretty stoked though because I can now ride my motorcycle to run errands today. When you weigh the two I guess it's ok that the weather is going to be in the seventies.

On a more serious note, the grass is brown. Or should I say -er. Browner. Sad news I tell ya.

Well it was a sad, as in boring update, but that's all I've got for you.

The Lord giveth....

....temporarily at least. I just got a call this morning from the temp agency I have been working with. They had sent me an email about a call center job, and after some debate, I told them I would like to be put in for it. Well, I guess they saw my resume and decided to accept me for one of the positions out of a possible twenty they had open. So what I'm saying is I am one out of twenty selectees out of a possible 1.6 million people that live in or around San Antonio. I'm the man, you can say it.

All kidding aside, I am very very thankful for this position. I like to work and feel productive, and this is a blessing. Hopefully after two months, that's how long this position is supposed to last, I will be able to find a better position or at least get offered a permanant position with them. I guess we will see what God has in mind for me/us.

Yo yo yo!

That's what homie clause says as he rides his ghettomobile through the streets.

Ok so anyway, I got to ride my motorcycle yesterday and today. Nowhere exciting, just the store, but it's still fun. Today, I rode over to The Rim, some new shopping center in the ritzy area of town. It's a little jaunt over there, so round trip, I probably went 35 miles. Not really far I guess, but man I really enjoyed myself.

I'm now back. You probably didn't know I was gone, but I went to Lifegroup, and now I am back. It was a good Lifegroup tonight.

We talked about a lot of stuff, some about "The Church" in the corporate sense, spiritual gifts, where we as a lifegroup want to be as far as our relationships with God and each other. Pretty much a bunch of theories and ideas, but well as you know, or will now know, I'm not much of a planner as much as I am a doer. I'd rather get to it and deal with whatever comes along as it comes along. Anyway, I'm being shown that I need to plan better, but also I want the Holy Spirit to move freely through me. I really think this lifegroup is finally getting on track a little more and at least in word is trying to get deeper.

Anyway before I start sounding too contrived I shall go to bed. Thanks again to you folks that updated. I was getting tired of reading the same posts over and over. And for you that have not updated, UPDATE, please?

It's official

Let it be known that I Justin "Jay" Myers am officially finished with my active military service. Two months shy of six years, that was initially meant to last only four years. Truth be told, I am thankful God worked it out this way, so at least we were able to buy a house, and find Katie a great job. Actually there are many things to be thankful for from having my service extended, but it would take me a long time to list them.
I would also like to say that I appreciate all your prayers and support in me finding a new career. It is quite the test of faith, but it helps a great deal to know y'all are with me/and the bean in prayer.

Here you go Caleb

I guess anyone can read this if they want, but since Shbelac asked for updates on Thaksgiving, here goes.
We went to Carl and Jenni's house and ate lots of food. Turkey, stuffing, greenbean casserole, mashed potatoes, ice tea, and pumpkin bread x2. Carl let me ride his Harley, which I must say was incredibly awesome and I want one for Christmas. Any takers? Or should I say volunteer givers? We watched some football and hung out. Nothing crazy or too exciting, but it was good nonetheless.

The Texas bathroom is done and it looks great. And yes I am tooting my own horn once again. And katie's horn too. Today I shall put up some garland, because I like it.

There you go.

Man it smells like updog!

Nothing much, how 'bout you? Good times.

The update.

No job.
Dude that can give me a job is on vacation....until Monday.
World Savings didn't want me.

Painted my guitar room.
In process of doing the Texas bathroom.

Went to Olive Garden.
I'm stuffed.
And thanks Maj for the gift card.

Still stoked to see Emily Elizabeth.

The sun still rose and set.
And the earth is still rotating.
Good times.

Eat pizza.

Come on now.

So I waited yesterday, and now today, but no call. I expected at least one of the two companies to give me a call and offer me a job. So much for expectations, eh. I ended up calling Avnet only to find out that the guy I first interviewed with is on vacation. He left a phone number of a woman that works there on his voicemail, so I call it. She said he didn't mention any of the hiring stuff to her, but she said I could call HR and see if they had any info. Well, I looked through my cell phone and found the HR number. I call this lady twice, but both times I got her voice mail.

As I'm typing this I am thinking through this dilemma, and am realizing maybe I am starting to worry and overreact. Maybe, maybe not. I just want to know what is going on and get a job. My time of terminal leave is coming to an end, and I'd really like to not be short on money. You know, paying bills aren't fun, but it has to get done, and it takes money to pay the bills, and well you get the picture. Anyway, I've now come to the conclusion, that I need to pray some more, and wait a few days (the weekend), and trust God to do His work. As hard and painful as it is to trust God sometimes, it must be done. This comes to mind, and really is hard, but once applied goes a long way. Philippians 4:6-7. And there's my lesson for the day.

The sky is falling!

Today I had my second interview with World Savings. Very exciting stuff. But not really. So I went and talked with the boss of the lady I initially interviewed with. She was nice enough, but not as nice as Maria. With Maria I felt that she was being pretty open and letting me see how she is. With Doris though, I didn't get that same feeling. So I'm not sure if she didn't like me or maybe she is just more reserved naturally.

Good news, I had some interviews with another company yesterday. They are way up 1604 almost to 35, so basically I'm trusting God to know what is best for me. I really hate traffic and this would be crazy traffic everyday to and from work. But, then again, I will go if that's who offers me a jorb. If you're wondering, the interviews there went very well, and I liked both people I interviewed with/for. It seems like a good company and the actual people working seemed happy enough and didn't mind talking too loudly in the halls, so it must not be too strict a place.

So, it comes down to this. What is your will GOD? I shall soon find out. Friday is the day both companies are looking to make a decision. WOOHOO.

And thanks again for putting up with all my ramblings, that is if you made it this far. Oh, and the sky isn't really falling.

Ode to Lasagna

Oh Lasagna you are so good.
With all your layers that don't taste like wood.
Your whole wheat noodles are cooked to perfection
With such great technology, they call convection.

Sauce from a jar, who knew it could be so great
Never would I think to use it as bait.
Add the cheese and then some more
So good you think someone brought it to my door.

Lasagna you are red, not blue or green
And thankful I am to the wonderful Bean
For making me dinner and lunch and dinner
Eating so much will make me the winner

Until the next time we meet
I will count out every single heartbeat
Oh Lasagna you are so good.
I'm still glad you don't taste like wood.

Sorry folks

So I tried messing with my blog, and now the comments are all messed up. Funny thing about messing with stuff. Anyway, I actually set it to have the comments back with my last post, but it did not work. So let's see if this works.

1st and 2nd Interviews

Last night I had my first face-to-face interview. It was with the same woman I had the phone interview last Friday, Maria. All in all I think it went well. She spent probably as much time asking me questions as she did telling me about her division and the company. I wasn't really nervous, which is surprising because I'm always nervous with stuff like that. You know, leading music, playing my guitar, interviewing, speaking in front of more than a few people, not favorites.
Anyway, we talked for about an hour, and she told me up front she wanted her manager to interview me. I think there is one other person in for a second interview, at least from what I think she was saying, but I'm optimistic. From everything we discussed about her section and the company, I really want to work there even more now than I even did before. I just received a phone call from HR there, and I have the interview on Tuesday.

On another note I played guitar at Lifegroup this week for the second time. Kind of nerve racking, see above, but it went well. A lady from church who is a music professor and incredible violinist, played with me. It was funny because as I got out my guitar and music she's like "What key are you playing in?", and I'm like "Oh, uh E" and she's like, "Oh that the hardest to play". Riiiigghhht. Professional violinist saying it's hard. I just laughed and then we started worship time. It was awesome! I started playing, and she kind of just went off playing along. She was improvising, or whatever you called, but it was great. It really added to our time worshipping and I was glad I wasn't the only one playing. Anyway, it was just a great time of worship and I hope she comes all the time. I mean, we already like her and her husband, but with her skillz, it would make her being there that much better.

Phone interview

After trying to get ahold of this lady from World Savings, I tracked her down. Or should I say, I left her another message and she called me back. Anyway, long story short, I had a phone interview on Friday, and I think it went pretty well. She also asked me about another position with World Savings that a coworker of hers is hiring for, so she forwarded my name for that one as well. Apparently she liked my answers enought to refer me to HR and now I am waiting for a call to go to a face-to-face interview sometime this week. The original position I'm interviewing for is some type of loan processor/researcher. I'm not totally sure of the duties involved, but from what the lady told me it sounds interesting. The other job she told me about is more of a loan counselor. Both sound appealing, and I'm very excited about them. I thought I would be nervous about even the phone interview, but I was actually calm and collected. Keep praying with us that one of these is what God wants for me.

Mongolian BBQ

Oh the humanity! I've never had mongolian barbeque, but I'm sure I will eat it as often as possible now. It's so good. I went to this place called Huhot's with Scott from lifegroup to meet for our weekly accountability time. Today was more of a hang out time, but that's all good. But it was good food, and the weather was nice enough to be able to ride my bike. It was a little cold, but I still had on three shirts so I must just be a wuss.

Anyway, I don't have a job still, but I looked at the place where Todd from lifegroup works, and it seems to have at least three jobs I could apply for. I would have to take a test to see if I know chemistry stuff, but hopefully I won't have too much of a problem. They do all kinds of research and development which sounds pretty fun. And that's what a job should be right? Hopefully his contact can hook me up, so pray for these positions because they sound like fun, and I could really enjoy doing them.

I'm on speed!!

Ok not really, but I'm I sure tricked you for just a minute there. Anyway, I just wanted to put my dsl speed on here, so I could still brag to Zach that my upload speed is faster. Not that my download speed is anywhere close, but hey.
You should try it, it's so much fun.

http://www.auditmypc.com/internet-speed-test.asp

Bring on the goat!

No, not the four legged barnyard animal! I shall vie for the coolest goat in North America with this man. I have a long way to go, but in the end I think I can come out on top.

Anyway, I ended up doing my final out on Thursday instead of today because the girl that was doing my paperwork is on leave today. So it was a nice to surprise to finish another day early. I still have a going away luncheon next Thursday, so I may have to shave, which is a bummer, but we'll see. Other than that, I'm still looking for a job, but I'm still optimistic.

It's late now so I think I'll go to bed. Have a nice weekend everyone and we'll talk to you later.

One more week

The time is fast approaching for me to exit Uncle Sam's Air Force. I'm pretty stoked and a bit melancholy about the whole thing. It's been a roller coaster of emotions and just craziness. All in all I am so thankful for the people I have met and been able to learn from in my time in the military. I think everyone should experience this great institution. Or maybe just check yourself into an institution and you may be better off. =)
Anyway, I want to thank all you folks for praying and caring for us over the past few years. Especially while we were in England. Y'all know the great times we had there, and we definitely needed/appreciate/are stronger for and with your prayers. I know you won't stop caring for us even if we're just normal civilians, but you know what I mean.
It's been fun, but I know God has something else for me and I'm ready to see Him show me. Pray for wisdom and patience now for us to wait for the job God wants me in and that we will clearly see His leading.

Thanks for your support y'all.

Job Fair

Ok, well thanks to all you kind and loving folks for praying that I would find a job. I did not actually get one, but at least I talked to a few people and gave them my resume. I did find out that USAA is having an internal job fair on their campus next month. So at least that's a lead. Plus I have the email address and phone number to their military recruiter, so hopefully I can give him a call and get my foot more in the door.

Well, I'll keep you updated if anything good comes around.

More of my bike

I never understood the interest people had in fixing old cars and making them as good or better than the original. Well, now I can fully understand. I am getting so excited to fix my bike up. Last friday I went and bought a new rear tire, oil, filter, and bar ends for the bike. They had to order the tire, so hopefully it will be here by wednesday. Once it gets here I'll have to take the tire to a shop down the road from here, and they will take the old tire off, put the new one on and balance the wheel. It should be fun stuff.
Tonight we bought some steel wool so I can clean the engine and surrounding areas and get all the oxidation off. On saturday I used a wire brush on one side, and it took a while, but it started getting clean. I also think I'm going to go to Walmart and buy some Mother's Chrome polish.

Anyway, I just wanted to keep y'all updated on the sweetness I call, uh, my bike. Maybe y'all could help me come up with a sweet name for it. That would be sweet.

I am now a licensed motorcyclist!

It felt like it would take me forever, but I have accomplished this massive feat of humanity. Ok it's not that big a deal, but I'm stinkin' stoked. I took the Motorcycle Safety Foundation class this weekend, which waived the riding portion of the state test, and then today I took the written/computer test. I even had time to come back home and grab all my important papers so I could register my bike on base. Now if only it wasn't raining I could ride my bike to work tomorrow.

I also applied for a civilian photographer position at a base near Lackland today. So please pray that this one really works out. I'm qualified, and it's right up my alley, so I really want this job. That and I don't have any other sure jobs, so this would work perfectly.

What up yo?

So, I'm at work, and it's hotter than blazes. I think I almost died it's so hot. Matter of fact, I did die, fortunately I also revived myself by self Jack Bauering myself. I know I make no sense, but man it's hot. It must be the heat making me all crazy.

Ok, well this has been a pretty much lame blog, but hey, you're the one still reading.

Chicken Burgers and fries

Yeah, so I just figured I'd update even though not much has been going on. We finally got to hang out with A&M last night. We barbequed and hung out in the pool, and then went back up to their apartment to watch 24 season 4. Quite exciting already, and we've only watched the first two episodes.
Tonight we are going to Chili's. I saw a commercial they have that tells about the "Make your own burger" deal. Sound kinda like Fudruckers, but maybe better, who knows.
So that's about it. Y'all can come over if you want though, I'm making chickenburgers..... and who doesn't love a good processed meat stovetop cooked CB?

Ok here's the real deal

We finally got our digital camera working, so we took some photos of my bike with me and bean. I have to polish the engine and whatnot, but for the most part I think I got a sweet deal. Thanks for looking. If any of you folks see my mom tell her my dad now needs a bike.

I got a MOTORCYCLE

Yes it's true. After years of scouring the globe, I finally found a motorcycle. I even paid for it and now am the official owner. It is a happy day for me. I was passing through craigslist and found it. The guy I bought it from just posted it this morning and I was the first to respond to his add. The carbs need cleaning, but other than that the bike is in great condition. There is some slight rust on the spokes of the rims, but I can hopefully steel wool them to get that off. The tires are new and the rest of the bike looks good. My boss Johnny went with me, as he knows quite a bit about bikes. He gave me the nod and I gave the guy the money. The guy even brought the bike to Johnny's house for me. I was going to have to come back and pick it up, or have Johnny's mechanic pick it up, so that was a very sweet bonus. The mechanic said hopefully I can have the bike back by friday or saturday and it will be running good, assuming the rest of the bike runs as good as it looks.
I don't have any pictures of my actual bike but here is one that very closely resembles mine. It will take me some time to polish up the chrome and the engine areas, but this bike is the same color and has the same style rims. My bike however does not have the wind screen.
Ok there you have it. Now I only have to get the old title, register this bike in my name, apply for a new title, get my license, buy a helmet and some gloves and take a rider safety course on base. That's it! =)

Oh the HTML

I figured I may as well make a little post since I'm on here anyway.

Once again I am trying to play with my title and creating my own custom header. Not working so well though. I created a faily simple design that I was just messing around with, but I can't get my head around the coding. What a pain. Maybe ZACH, you can hook a brotha up!

Back to the Daily Grind

Ok, well not so much since my job is much easier than I'm sure most of yours. And not that I'm bragging, it's just that "daily grind" doesn't really fit. More like back to the Halo.

Anyway, I got back on thursday night to rain and awesomeness. I pretty much love San Antonio, and this great state of Texas. Oh more like I am just super stoked to be back at home with my beautiful bride Beene.

Work was good yesterday. I pretty much should have just taken it off seeing how we didn't do anything except for one work order. I didn't however get a chance to play Halo, so that's unfortunate.

As for my trip to CA, it was pretty awesome. By awesome I would mostly say because I golfed four of the seven days, and on another day we went to the range to hit some balls. So really five of the seven days included golf. My dad's birthday was fun, and I got to see a lot of family that I hadn't seen in quite some time. Over all it was a great time. Oh and to top it off, I got to eat prime rib at Cattlemens. Always a favorite.

Ok well I did a lot more than I will write because the list could go on and on, but suffice it to say I had a great week in sunny California. Life is good and the all that stuff.

It's been long enough

For those of you that still read my incredibly awesome blog, I will update.

These past few weeks have been great. I really am glad to be so close to family. After the long three years in England, it is a huge blessing to be within a few hour drive of some family.

On a sidenote, there is a lot of you "Family" that is not in Texas, I will say the D. KEITH WALKERS have an excuse, seeing as they are going on for the Lord and all, yet the others should probably go ahead and move down here.

Anyway, having Zach and Marla here was really nice. We got to go tubing and to Corpus. I think I enjoyed tubing the most. Probably because all you have to really do is sit there and float. Sometimes I think God should have said laziness is next to Godliness. But hey what can you do?
Then going to Dallas was fun as always. I don't like the drive, but it can be fun when you stop(thanks Zach). Next time we'll have to get some walkie talkies.
We got beene's computers which I'm sure you all know. It is the dinky though. For those of you that don' know what that is, dinky =cool.

Pretty much I ramble. So add everything up that we have done the past few weeks and it would equate to good times.

I'm getting ready to fly to CA for my dad's 50th birthday. I'm pretty stoked because I haven't seen my mom and dad for many moons. Or a year and a half. The golfing should be sweet too. Let it be known though that if I get beat it is because I've only been golfing once this year.
If y'all could pray I get there and back safely and have good visits with all the myers. I think the week is going to go by way too quick.

Well I'll post again sometime next month.

~posted by The Bean

Workin weekends

I'm sitting in the information center of the hospital. It's 227 right now, and fortunately I got some coffee, so I'm awake. It's kinda weird working at the hospital and telling people where to go, and answering the phone, because I have no real clue what I'm doing. I got a 45 minute briefing the other day, but it kind of just skimmed through what I'm supposed to do. I'd say though I'm doing pretty well all things considered.
Hey at least I got to watch the last quarter of the Mav's game, so I was pretty stoked. And they won, for those of you who did not watch or want to know.
Anyway, life's going pretty good. I can't wait to see Zach and Marla, and getting off work should be nice. Hopefully we'll get the shelves in the garage built. That's what I really want to get done.
I start school on tuesday so that's a bummer, but the more I do, the sooner I will get a degree.

Anyway, I'm just starting to ramble, so I'll post more another time.

Love you all and I'll talk to you later.

Work

As I'm sure all of you have read Bean's blog, so you know what we've been up to and what we plan to do in the next few days. I have to call the people whose house we are going to so I can say hi, and hopefully get directions. I've got to say, that calling total strangers and asking for directions to their house so we can crash their barbecue isn't my forte, but I'm hoping that they don't mind too much. I'm sure they won't, and that it will be great fun. We're praying that we have finally found our church. It's been so long since we've had a HOME church, and I am really optimistic about this one. Please pray with us in this.

Oh and on another note, does anyone notice that work coffee is always the best. I don't know why that is, but it seems to me that I can make coffee and home and it is never as good. But actually the best coffee ever is at IHOP or Denny's. I haven't had any of it in a little while, but hey what can you do.

Are they serious?

Ok, I just saw a Chevy Tahoe commercial. The commercial begins with a panoramic shot of a large field of sunflowers. They are gently blowing in the breeze on a seemingly refreshing crisp morning. Then comes the shot of the Tahoe driving down a curvy road with sunflowers blowing behind it. You get this nice relaxed, clean feeling of no cares or worries. The nice voice calmly tells how wonderful the Tahoe is and what great gas mileage it gets. What is that number you ask? 22 MPG.
Now I'm not Green Peace guy or hard core ecology freak, but are you kidding me? I mean I have two trucks that get 22 MPG or less. But I'm paying for the gas because I chose to drive these trucks. The question that I have is, since when is 22 MPG something to brag about? I guess I wouldn't use the 22MPG as a selling point.

Crazy Chevy!

No bike for me

I went to the police auction yesterday and came back empty handed. There were four bikes, which usually means that at least a couple are decent enough to buy. The two I was hoping for, an '84 Kawasaki GPZ, and an '84 Kawasaki KZ700. Both turned out to be in really poor condition, and needed more work than I wanted to put in. Quite the bummer, but what can you do? There was a 1996 or something close to that, Suzuki GSX-R, but it went for a ridiculous $2,900! So in the end I still don't have a bike.

On a good note, I was inspected yesterday, or should I say, my fitness program was inspected. The military likes to make sure every couple of years that everything is running smoothly. It seems that I did pretty well considering the inspector guy was only there for about thirty minutes. We shall see though.

I need to finish getting ready for work, so I guess I'll be going. Mostly I'm starving so I'm going to eat an english muffin and then drink a latte, then I'll go to work. Ok, I'm going.

Oh, I still have hope though that I'll get a bike before too long, and one that I really want. The Suzuki GS500E. Anyway, stay classy San Diego.

More bike stuff

I gotta admit, I really just love bikes. I can't wait to get one. Hopefully this coming wednesday, I'll buy one.
Anyway I was talking to one of my bosses and he was telling me about some other bikes I should look at. That is after I make some money and after I get used to my first bike. Anyway, one I was telling Zach about, the Suzuki SV-650S is a nice bike, with great gas mileage.
He then told me about a dual-sport that gets super good gas mileage and also has some good power, the Kawasaki KLR650. I don't know, both are good bikes and fairly cheap for being new bikes, but I still don't have that kind of money. But hey if you haven't made any contributions to good causes this year, I would be happy to invest your hard earned dollars into a new bike for a worthy cause. Me being the worthy cause that is.

Caesar Idol

Yes it is true, some folks in ancient history Idolized Caesar, but I'm talking about some not so old stuff. Actually it better have been pretty new or that's gross.
Anyway, the Bean and I went over to A&M's house tonight to watch American Idol and eat some really awesome Little Caesars pizza, with crazy bread. It wasn't as crazy as it was bready and garlicy. But it was great either way. Bean's known Matt ever since she started working at Cap Group, but I have only known him and his wife for two short weeks. It's pretty great having friends to hang out with.
Hopefully tomorrow of thursday I'll get to ride Johnny's bike and get some practice. If I haven't said before Johnny is my boss at work. He also found out about the police impound auctions. There's been a few bikes the past few weeks, but next week and the week after there are going to be at least four bikes up for auction each week. Most are categorized as prisoner's property or uninsured, so that usually means they haven't been wrecked. I'm hopeful that they won't go very high, and I can get one for even cheaper than what Johnny has estimated them to go for. One on the 17th is a Suzuki GSX-R 750. It's actually the bike I've wanted since we lived in England and a guy at work had one. They're sweet bikes and they look pretty sweet too.
Anyway, the Kings are playing and I'm hoping the beat the junk out of the Spurs.

Which one

One of these I've bought, the other is what I really really want. Guess which is which.
Yeah, so I'm done with school now for a while. I'm pretty stoked.

Platelets

I told my boss that the next time he went to donate, I would go. They went two weeks ago, but it ended up that I had to go to the OR for a shoot, so I didnt get to go that time. So today he came back and asked if I was going. I really wanted to, but man I was a bit nervous. Apprehensively I went. I went once a while back, but only to watch and see how the process worked. I really didn't think I would want to donate, but now it's not so bad. I got there today, and the people that work there are laid back and quite nice. My boss and Al have been going for a long time so they know all the workers there, and they all just have a good time when they come in.
I was still a little nervous, but considering my boss goes every two weeks, it couldn't be that bad. All said and done it was easy and pain free. It was nice because they put a numbing agent on your skin, then they inject some numbing stuff just under the skin, but you can't feel that injection because your skin is already numb. Then when they are ready to hook up the blood tube you don't feel that because your arm in that spot is numb. Then I figured I would feel weird after I donated, but not at all. It's cool because they draw your blood, but after the machine processes the platelets out, it puts your blood back into you, so you don't get that light headed or nauseous feeling.
All said and done I think everyone should donate platelets. You don't have to be scared because I'm a big wuss, and if I can do it, so can you.

And a big plus, it takes about an hour or hour and a half, so you get to watch a movie and eat cookies and crackers and drink Dr. Pepper. I had a great time.

Oh school

So I am in my last four days of English, and then I will have a 5 week break. I decided to take a break so I can study for promotion. Although, I may not ever get to put on another stripe if I don't reenlist. I'm still on the fence. Oh the fence. I reckon Chuck should come knock it down with a motorcycle and then I'd have a decision much easier.
Other than those two things, not much else has been going on.
We're in a tornado watch. That's pretty sweet. But not so much.
Oh and I just took over for my squadron's PT program. So now I'm in charge of making sure people are in shape and following the rules for staying fit. I kinda don't want to do it, but then again, it will be good for my resume.
Oh boy, my favorite!
Later on.

The Bean is HOME

Well two days ago she got home, but it's sweet nonetheless. Paj, I don't have it as bad as you, but I feel you on the not functioning on all cylinders when your woman is gone. But she's back!
And our 4runner got here. It's pruty hot. But I'll let bean tell you about it seeing how it is her truck.

I'm in my forth week of english now, and surprising...or not surprisingly it isn't too bad. Normally I would think english stinks, but UoP is not exactly the hardest school.

The Spurs are on top. That's sweet. I need to watch some more games to be ready for the playoffs. Should be great.

It's time for dinner though, so I reckon I'll check on my pizza.
Later on.

Tax and UoP

The good news is we received our tax return from the state of California today. The bad news, is that although during the year we will no longer see extra money every month taken out of our paychecks for the state, we won't get a little present at the end of every year. So depending how you look at it, it's a bummer and a sweet deal!
In other sad news, I started a new class last week. English. Also known as......nuts! I can't stand English. It's not fun and I'm not good at it. Yeah, yeah save all the funny jokes. I'm aware that you could find tons of typos and mistakes, I know, I could really use this class. Yet I don't really want to do it. Then again, only three and a half weeks and it's over and on to Geography of World Commerce.

OK, well the Spurs are about to start, so I'm gonna watch. It's not the Kings, but then again the Spurs are doing much better than my real home team.

My new and slightly improved blog

It feels like I change my template pretty often, but oh well. My last template was just so hard to work with, so I found one that was easier to play with. Hopefully over not too long of a span I will have cool pictures and other cool html and java junk. We'll see.

In other news, we finally got the garage cleaned out and swept and then put back in order. Although I could use a Zachary and maybe chuck and caleb to help me with some shelves and a workbench. I was measure tonight where to put the workbench and shelves, now it's just a matter of getting some help to build them.

I finish Human Nutrition tonight, and start College Writing tomorrow. Just because I am in the class though, does not mean I will apply what I learn to use in this blog. That's all I have to say about that.

And the last thing I will say or ask is for y'all to pray for God's leading in my career path. I'm really not sure what to do as far as getting out and finding a civilian job or staying in the military. I do know that praying though will eventually bring an answer to this crazy question. Thanks.

The Professional

I'm pretty stoked. I was pretty sure that when I came here I wouldn't be able to get any of my photos published, but today I was proven wrong. Unfortunately it is really not part of my job here that I took photos of. It was mostly a few shots of one of guys in the shop doing his job. He's an illustrator, and he is the man. Really I'm just glad I get to work with him, so one day when he gets real famous I can say " I know that guy". You can check some of his stuff out here....

Anyway back to the story. So I am getting something published, which is pretty great if I ever want to get a photography job outside of the military. Not likely I will want to, but just in case.
Alright well it's not that exciting of news, but it's my news, so hey.

Oakhills

So bean just found in the church paper that Big Daddy Weave and Todd Agnew are going to play a concert there. Oh by the way, when I say church paper, it's not like the weekly trifold bulletin or oven flyer, no I mean actual newspaper that probably has the thickness of the NY Times A section. Stinkin crazy. Anyway, so we think we may go see them seeing how it's so close and all. Plus Big Daddy Weave is pretty good. Not as good as say Jars of Clay or Third Day, but good nonetheless.

Not much has really been happening. We cleaned house and hung some pictures finally. I mean to say the house is usually clean, so it's not "finally" that we cleaned it. But that Finally we hung some pictures. Either way it's good stuff.
Now we just have to get the garage painted and then some shelves and work table made/bought/I don't know.

The view!

I'll upload a few more, but this is the view from my hotel. It's weird there not more snow, but I guess they are having their heat wave. The 40's and all. Well, I have to get ready to catch my shuttle to the airport, so I'll post more later.

I'm in the Big CO

Well, if you didn't know I get to take pictures of autopsies. It's not the most fun job, but I think it's pretty interesting. Today I flew into Colorado Springs for one of these fun jobs. I was told before hand that this would be the nastiest job as of yet, and they were right. But when it comes down to it, it wasn't so bad, and I'm making a little extra money for coming here. I can't complain. However it's weird to be in a hotel all by myself. Actually Johnny is here to train me, and also the pathologist, but you know what I mean. Anyway, I finally got done, ate some dinner, and now I'm just hangin out, using the free internet access.
I'm sure my sentences are worse than usual so maybe I should go. I'm pretty tired. It's only one hour different here, but all the flying and standing makes tired.
Anyway I hope eveyone is doing good.
Oh have I said how beautiful Colorado is? It is so nice to see mountains again!
Alright, I'm out.

Nice weekend

Although the weather is cold, it's been a pretty great weekend. Katie got to go out Friday with Brandy, and I got to do homework. Then Saturday, we hung out and watched movies and stuff at home. I also got a Whataburger. I think it's my new favorite burger place, other than In-n-Out. Then yesterday we went to Oak Hills Church. I think Katie posted about it already, but it was good. It seems really huge, but they say they try to make it as small church atmosphere as possible. We met this lady, and she explained all about the small groups and the sunday school classes and what not. We are very hopeful about this church. We have to call the director lady about which small group to join. As of yesterday there is only 20 small groups "Open". 10 adults groups with kids, 10 adult groups without. I know not much of a selection. But actually we are optimistic. We'll keep praying God is showing us where to go.
Last night we went to Date Movie. It was kinda gross in some parts, but on the whole a pretty funny movie. And right now we're gonna go to IHOP for breakfast. What a great weekend eh?
Well I do have to finish my homework for the week, but I'm sure I'll be energized by the pancakes and coffee.
Hope y'alls weekends went good and you're not freezing too much. What's the deal with low pressure?

iPod Nano

Dude, so I got a Nano! It has got to be the coolest present ever. Bean got it for me for Valentines Day. She'd been all excited to give it to me, and I thought I had an idea, but I was wrong. In a good way. It's even better than a new Palm Pilot I thought it was. So I just want to say what an awesome wife I have.

In other news, I got to go to Ft Hood yesterday. That was lots of fun. Three hours to, and three hours back, plus you know, doin' my job. Good times. At least I got paid some extra money. So that's cool. And because I worked SOOOO hard yesterday, I got today off work. So all in all, not a bad deal.

I'm still sick, but almost better. However my stinkin jaw has been popping all day. I barely open my mouth and it pops. Maybe it's a sign for me not to open my mouth. And that would be ok, except then I don't get to eat, and frankly eating is on my top five things to do. Probably top one other than breathing.

Ok well anyway, I sure hope all you folks reading my blog had a good day, and that the sun is shining. Or moon is beaming? I don't know

Dang sick people

Well I thought I was in the clear since I didn't get sick right after katie, but I was wrong. I started feeling like junk yesterday and got worse through the night. I hate being sick. It's only a sinus thing, but it hurts my throat. That's the worst. Anyway, other than that, I just sitting at work, finally having some free time. I worked Thursday, Friday and today hardcore. It's pretty nice to be real busy, but it makes your eyes hurt when you're looking at a screen for 8 hours.

working hard

One of my favorite all time lines from SNL. You know the one with President Bush. Yeah good stuff. Anyway, I'm here at work and I finally got done with all my work orders. It took me all day to get them logged out. You gotta love the web based databases. Or not so much.
Not much has been happening I guess. I went to some girls house from work who helped me get my rear brakes done. Then yesterday I did the front brakes in our garage. What a great feeling! I even got to buy a hydralic jack. That made my day. I think I have really gotten the hang of disc brakes. It only took me about 45 minutes to get the front done. Maybe that's not quick, but I was happy. Once again it could be that I got to use my own garage and tools. I don't know.
I'm in my last week of class, in which we are learning how to write. Long story short, not such a good class. But how much can you really learn in 5 weeks?
After this class I start Human Nutrition. I think it will be fun, but then again, it may make me feel bad about all the pizza and Olive Garden I eat.....Nah probably not.
Oh I almost forgot to tell you about the church we went to on yesterday. I can't say it was a bad church, it actually had a pretty good message, well it made me think, and that's what counts. Anyway, I think including all the little kids, there may have been thirty people. Katie made a comment that we are always in the extremes. Either the church is toooooo big or too small. Is it so hard to find a church that is somewhere in the middle as far as people?
Ok well I hope everyone had a relaxing good weekend. We sure did.

Another thing

I guess I'm really just in a weird mood, but maybe that's alright. Plus that has nothing really to do with this post. Anyway...

Have you guys heard that Mercy Me song "I Can Only Imagine"?
I don't know, but if there was a song that really gets me, this would be it. I can't wait to see Jesus. I know I might have another 50 to 60 more years hopefully on this earth, but I can't wait. That song just makes me so excited to be able to be in His presence. Standing before him, kneeling, bowing, dancing, singing, quiet in awe, I don't know what I'll really do, but I can only imagine that it will be the most awesome experience to see and touch Him. I am so glad He loves me and wants me there with Him someday.

What to do

By now I'm more than sure y'all have read or heard about Katie's new job. Those few weeks of prayer and awesome answers from God were so great. I truly believe God used that experience to build Katie and I up. He showed us His awesomeness and love and how he works in such miraculous ways. I really can't express the joy that these answers brought me. God is so good.
I just thought I would get that out because I don't say that enough. God is always in our prayers and in our lives even when it seems like he's not listening. It's hard to be confident in that fact sometimes, but this experience has really strengthened my grasp(however small that grasp may be)on God's desire for us to pray to him. I am thankful and truly blessed to be saved and loved by Him.

Please keep praying for me to know whether God wants me to stay in the military or get out and find a civilian job.

I've been tagged....

Ok well I guess I'll respond to the questions, but I don't know who else to tag...

4 Jobs that I have had in my life:
Photographer: Right now I take photos in the Operating Room for Doctors, so they
can train other doctors.
Barrista: I worked at Starbucks for a second job in England. Probably one of
the best jobs I've ever had.
Assembly Worker: I worked for a pool cleaner manufacturer. Great fun it was.
Stocker/Bagboy: At the Valley Market in Happy Valley


6 Movies I could watch over and over:
Office Space
Pirates of the Carribean
Billy Madison
Zoolander
Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy
SNL: Best of Jimmy Falon

4 places I've lived:
Lakeridge, Virginia
Omaha, Nebraska
RAF Alconbury, England
Happy Valley, California

4 TV shows I love to watch:
Extreme Makeover: Home Edition
Friends
Seinfeld
Cops-Although I just got to watch it for the first time in a real long time.

4 Places I have been on vacation:
Menorca, Spain
Mt. Bachelor, Oregon
Blue Ridge Mountains, Virginia
Graceland, Tennesee

4 Websites I visit daily: Other than blogs
CNN
Daily Bread
In Touch Today
University of Phoenix

4 of my favorite foods:
The new stuffed shells at Olive Garden
Pizza. Papa John's is the best, but I like Digourno and most others as well.
Prime Rib. The best is from Cattleman's in Redding, CA
Bertha Burgers.

4 Places I would rather be right now:
Skiing, doesn't matter where, but it would be nice to be with Zach and Brenda
and the rest of the skiin walkers.
Redding, CA hanging with the homies and my parents
Maybe in the carribean on the beach
At home doing homework...it needs to get done.


I'm not tagging anyone. Is that ok?

It's been a while....

Yes, I know, I am quite the slacker. What can I say?
Well for one, I just restarted school again. The class I am taking is College Writing, or something like that. It has to do with English, so I am sure that it will not be fun and exciting. But hey, you have to keep your eye on the prize.
Then I found out I would be on call a day early because my boss, that was on call, is now going TDY to do a job in the great state of Louisiana. So now I have an extra chance to be woken up late or early depending on how you look at it, to take photos of hurt or messed up people. I know what you're thinking, That sounds really fun. Yeah, not so much, but it's my first time since I've been here, so it's all good.
I'm sure you've read Katie's blog, but I just want to say have thankful we are to just have her going to job interview. I know that she's got skills, so she should be able to get the job just fine. We'll keep praying.
Oh and Happy Birthday Mom!

Dallas is awesome

As I'm sure you have read Bean's blog, that we went to dallas for New Years. It was purty awesome. I finally got to meet Gary and Karen, and Jennifer and Patrick. We had a good time. Especially the Ping Pong. Just ask Maj. We're pretty even matched. Although, I think she beat me more than I beat her. Oh well it was great fun. While at Gary's, Paj bought Marshall's BBQ. It was great. I could really go for some right now.

I'm sure I'll come up with some more stuff to write, hopefully. Hope everyone had a great New Year!

It's Christmas Eve Day!

The Bean and I are finally finished all the shopping. We had one last present for each other to get, so we did that this afternoon. Then we watched an episode of Friends Season 6, and I cut the turkey/ham, and now Bean is making the crust. We are going to Crossbridge Community Church today at 5:30 for the Christmas Eve service, and then we'll come home and have pizza and a movie.
Hopefully we can find a church to go to tomorrow, but we'll have to do some searching.

Merry Christmas everyone, and I hope your eves and Christmas will be fun and festive!

Less than a week

It is going to be a good week. Only four days of work this week two days next week. How awesome is that. I guess the military has some good deals to it. And then we get to see Paj and Maj and Belac and Lauri, and Nanny, who I haven't seem in years. Mostly it will be like meeting her all over again, but that should be sweet too.
We decorated some more last night, so now the house looks more festive. And we moved furniture so we can be ready when our new couches and dining room table get here. It should be great, especially so I don't have to sit here on the floor typing.
Well I need to finish getting ready for work, so have a nice week everyone and soon it will be Christmas.

Christmas Info about me!

That was a good idea, so I'm stealing Marla's idea. So here's my info

Hot Chocolate or Egg Nog? I'll drink Egg Nog, but I much prefer the Hot Chocolate
Does Santa wrap the presents or just set them under the tree? There's no such thing as Santa Claws!
Colored or white lights on the tree/house? It makes no difference as long as there is lots of them. But my awesome wife likes the blue lights, so those will definitely always be around.
When do you decorate? Well this is our first year really decorating a lot, and we still aren't done, so I'd have to say all the way up until christmas. Next year will be sooner.
What is your favorite holiday dish? I really like the sweet potatoes, and pecan pie, but on the whole I just love getting together and eating a ton with family. Family is what all the memories are derived from for me.
Favorite Holiday memory as a child? I actually have some of the best memories when we finally got to spend Christmas with all the family. Ever since we were little we lived far from family, so when we got to be in CA for Christmas with Grandpa Bob and the whole crowd of Stricklands it was great!
Do you open gifts on Christmas Eve? No, but I always want to.
What kind of cookies do you set out for Santa on Christmas Eve? Well if I did, I would set out some awesome cookies from England called digestives. That would be funny.
Snow! Love it or hate it? I love it so much. I really want to come to Redding to go skiing!!!!! I miss my skis!
Can you ice skate? Yeah, but it's been years since I have.
What is the most important thing about the holidays for you? It is good to remember why we celebrate Christmas, but it is also a good time to evaluate the past year and life in general. I know that Christmas always gets me thinking about how I can live me life better and more meaningfully.
What’s your favorite holiday dessert? Oops, I already put it, but Pecan pie is the greatest. My grandma Betty makes a great pecan pie. I'm sure there's more, but for right now I'll leave it at that.
What type of tree? Real for sure. Not really sure though that I have a preference on the type. I think we have a Douglas Fir this year. And since it's our first Christmas in four Christmas's I guess I'd have to say then that Douglas Firs are the coolest.
Which do you prefer, giving or receiving? I like both. Sometimes it's great to give a gift that you know the other person really really wants and it's a surprise when you get it for them, that's a great feeling to see their face light up when they get it. But I sure do like to get presents too.
What is your favorite Christmas Carol? I'm not sure that I have a favorite, I just like them all because they bring back such good memories.
Candy Canes, YUCK or YUM? I like them. But after having too many I get tired of them. Like Crazy Uncle said, when having Camel breath, it's good to have a candy cane!

So much to do...

So USAA, our bank and insurance people, also who we went through to find a realtor gave us a check just to use them. What a great deal. So now Katie and I are going to get a garage door opener, and some shelves for her in the closet. We already have shelves, but it seems as thought the builder made the shelves for an NBA center. I can reach them, but even I have to reach quite a bit to get my stuff up there. Anyway so I guess it's cool that really these two things are free to us, seeing as all we had to do is say " Sure we'll take a free realtor that we can trust, and then have you give us a chunk of money to do so." or something like that. Good stuff.

Even better we finally got katie's compy upgraded to TIGER so now she's as cool as me and zach and do you have it PAJ? Well you should get it if you don't. Oh wait wasn't I supposed to get that for you? Yeah nevermind.......

I'm really excited that our downstairs and to the right is all done. The kitchen and fireplace room look good. Just as long as you don't look in the garage or upstairs. It's weird, I don't know where to put everything. We hid so much junk in the closets in England that now that we had to put it into boxes, now I don't want to take the junk out. Oh the humanity!

Alright, well I'm kinda just rambling like always, so I guess I'll go.

What a great weekend

We got back in last night around 8:30 so it took about as long to get home as it did to get there. But five hours of driving well worth it. I finally got to meet Lindsay and the other Justin and Kara and Aaron...and little Walker, and George and June. It was great. I thoroughly enjoyed all the food and "hurt myself" on a few occasions. But hurting myself never tasted so good.
Hopefully we will get to see you all again real soon. It's really nice to be so close to family. I think everyone should just move to Texas seeing how it is such a nice state.
Anyway I've really got a bunch of thoughts in my head that I want to say, but they just don't seem to be coming out right, but I will say Thank you to the Walkers for being so warm and welcome and letting us hang out for a few days. We Highly enjoyed it.

On another note, does George really have his own blob...I mean blog? Cuz if he does I'd sure like to see.

Alright, well I reckon I'll talk/see y'all later.

It's THANKSGIVING!

It's a great day in America. We get to go hang out with familia, and eat some great food. And like many of you have said on your blogs or in your comments, there is a lot to be thankful for. God has provided so freely and graciously this year and every year for that matter. But I want to specifically say that I am so thankful that God safely brought Katie and I back to our great country safely and ahead of schedule. If some of you folks didn't know, we are not supposed to be back here to the US until late January, but fortunately the Air Force and DOD decided to downsize, and now we are here. I also want to thank God for the smooth transition to Texas. It seems that everything fell into place. Which is very unlike our move to England, so it just made this move that much better. I am thankful for the house God is giving us. We don't deserve anything He gives us, but we are sure thankful that He is such an awesome God.

I really hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving, and that we all have many things to thank God for this year.


And don't forget to watch football!

Better Day

Well after having a horrible first day at work here in San Antonio, I was a bit nervous as to how my second day would be. To start my day off right, I went to the gym and did some cardio, so as to at least get rid of some stress. Then when I got to work, the mean grumpy guy was not there. To say the least I was very very relieved.
However, I was informed that the work load is slow most of the time, and at times busy in short spurts. So I am a little bummed because that's how England was, and I would really like to do some work. I mean it is nice to get paid to do much or do little, but I know when I get out in a year, I will not be used to working so much and then it will take me longer to get used to the load. I don't know it sounds stupid, but I really just like to work when I go to work.

Later on after I was about to go home, I received a call from our house salesman and the loan officer. It was supposed to be good news that the Appraiser did his job and that all the other paperwork will progress without a hitch.....Except for the fact that the underwriters want to have a piece of paper that says I plan to reenlist and also they want a paper that says I am indeed eligible to reenlist.
The problem with that is I had thought because I had turned down promotion testing, I thought I would not be eligible to reenlist. This caused my beautiful bride to turn into a ball of nerves. Fortunately for us the Air Force in their Infinite wisdom made a personnel website where I can check things like reenlistment eligibility and whatnot, so I checked and found out we will be able to reenlist if we so desired(we don't). Anyway, now we are happy and relieved and ready to finish with the buying and closing of the house.

Anyway I thought I would include a picture of my truck. This is the type of sense of humor of the clowns I work with....good times. I drove all the way home from work with this on my truck. And to think this is the work of my boss' boss' boss.

First real day of work....

How I wish I could just stay home and get paid. It was so nice to have the ten days to house hunt, but now I really just don't feel like going to work. I guess I shouldn't complain because I know most of you didn't get free time off work to look for a place, but MAN!
Ok I'll stop being a wuss.
Anyway Thanksgiving is soon and now we get to for sure go to Uncle Rick and Aunt Denise's house. It should be pretty sweet. Since we haven't really had a traditional Thanksgiving since we've been married, this should be great. Don't get me wrong, it was nice to eat pizza in Rome and other stuff in Germany, but I am very excited for some turkey and mashed potatoes and whatever else there might be. And FOOTBALL! That is gonna be great. Sadly I haven't watched football in two or three weeks, since the last time I went to Football Frenzy in England, so watching football real time should be great!
Alright, well as much as I'd like to put it off, I should probably go to work. Hope y'all have a great day and we'll see some of you real soon.

A shameless plea to come visit us in San Antonio

So if you weren't already thinking of coming to this great city to visit us fine folks down here, hopefully these pictures will help you make the right decision. That is to come see!
We went downtown to see the riverwalk and what not. It was only my second time ever, the first being right after boot camp, so it wasn't nearly as much fun as seeing it with the bean, but anyway it was katie's first time down there and I'm sure we'll go back numerous times. It's a great atmosphere and relaxing, except I'm sure on Saturdays right after boot camp graduation.
Anyway enough rambling, here are some of the photos we took today. Not many, but sure fun to look at.










































And ten points to the first person that can tell me what kind of bird this is....Keith and Belac you better get this one.

My new truck

We finally took some pictures of our sweet new to us used cars. It's quite exciting if you ask me. So it does have some dents and dings and what not, but technically this is the newest car I have ever owned. So I'm pretty stoked. Hey it's only 5 years, or 6 if you count that new cars now are 2006s instead of '05 although it is still 2005....but you get me.
So here it is in all its glory.


In other news, we got our washer and dryer today. Unfortunately our maintenance guys didn't get around to installing it, so we can't do laundry until tomorrow. And no I would have done it myself seeing as how it is not difficult, but they think they are too cool for school, so we have to wait.
Hope you like my new sweet bamboo background. I was getting bored with my blog, so I needed to change something, but I don't have all those skills like Zach to really hook it up. So what I'm sayin is HEY ZACH hook a brotha up!

We have a sidewalk

Yes it is great news. We now have a driveway and sidewalk in front of our house.
We have been looking at furniture, but we weren't quite sure how big the living room was, so we decided to go back to Michael's office who sold us the place, and get the measurments from him. Fortunately for us he was busy with some other customers, so we got to go look at our house again. As we pulled up we noticed they had poured the concrete and gotten it all done in the past day or so. Good stuff. You know it woulda kinda stunk to not be able to drive into the garage, so on the whole I think it's pretty sweet we have a driveway.
In other news, we now have two cars. Actually a truck and a car. And really I guess right now we are borrowing some cars, with the plans to pay for them on monday. Hopefully we don't run into any more snags. The short version is it was a pain to get the whole deal worked out, but in the end the good guys always win and so we won.
Alright, well that's all I have.

Hablo español en solamente cuatro dias

Yeah right, but hey we're here and stoked. As I'm sure you read bean's blog, we found a house. We have the coolest Realtor in the world. She took us around yesterday and the last one we looked at was the stuff. Anyway long story short we now have to do all the piles and trees worth of paperwork to get the place. But that's ok because we are so happy and thankful God has provided so much already in the short time we've been here.
On a not so good note I think I am sick now. So far my throat just hurts, but I'm feeling kinda..... not so good. But oh well.......
Again thank you all for your prayers. We have seen the rewards of those prayers in so many ways. God really has taken care of so much and we pray for continued blessings and the finding of a church. Hopefully this weekend we will be able to start the hunt. Hopefully it will not be much of a hunt, maybe more like a sitting duck, but we'll see.
Ok I'll go now, more to come very shortly I'm sure.

More ramblings

As I am sure everyone is so enthralled with my posts, I will give you yet another.
Today I had the final housing inspection. To give you some background, when the woman came for the pre-inspection she told me how nice and clean the house already was. Of course I took that as a compliment because my beautiful wife katie is the man when it comes to cleaning. So I was happy to think I wouldn't have to do any super hardcore cleaning. Which I didn't, but I did clean the whole house, it just wasn't dirty, so it was just touch up work. Last night after telling my buddy Foltz goodbye, I came home and finished up the laundry and mopped the floors. Confident that the house was in better then inspection order......Stinking lady. Not so much. Although she didn't point too many things out, she white gloved me. What's the deal with that? She just inspected my other friend Bladen and took all of 5 minutes at his house. And even if he exaggerated that, it still could of taken 10, 20 minutes? Yeah well my appointment was for 9 am, she arrived just a little before that. Before I knew it ,it was 10:00! And to add insult to injury, the day or two before my inspection I went to the housing office to check to make sure it was ok that I left the mower and gas cans and what not. They said "Sure, mate, that should be fine, no worries, I'll even tell the lady that I told you that." What I should have taken that to mean was "Are you crazy you buffoon, no way can you leave all that junk in your shed, and yes I will tell the inspector lady that you are a big, I say BIG moron."
Anyway, so I did leave the stuff, only to find out that by leaving the stuff there, I greatly offended the inspector lady. Shame on me!
After much tribulation, all was taken care of and now we no longer live on 1110B Birch. It's a great day......eventually.
Now I am happy to relax for a few days and have no worries except for an appointment at Molesworth tomorrow. The weight and stress of this moving are dissipating and now I am much relieved. Happy Days are here again.
Thanks for all of your prayers. I am sure that God is working in this move and keeping me sane and free of over burden.
I love all of you that read this blog, even if I haven't met you yet. See you soon in Texas.