Caleb

Walmart is not my favorite place to hang out. I prefer to make my once-a-month shopping visits at about 2 in the morning because there is nobody in the way and the re-stocking crew knows exactly where everything is. Due to circumstances beond my control (getting a jeep worked on at a neighboring dealership, I had to had to hang out there for a while yesterday afternoon.

Since Mothers Day is tomorrow I decided that I should look for a card for my mom. A walk by the card isle quickly made me decide that it was too crowded and I should come back later. Two subsequent walk-bys made me think I might not get a chance to pick out a card at all. Upon my fourth visit I hung around long enough to realize that I was missing out on some great people watching.

There isn’t much funnier than watching guys trying desperatly to find a card for their moms. Enter some woman on the scene and one of them will get up enough spunk to ask for suggestions, and I had to move to the next isle so people wouldn’t notice me laughing.

My own search was not very fruitfull. In the end I decided to make one myself becaues the only ones availible seemed to be for people who couldn’t actually think of anything nice to say.

It’s not easy for me to summarize my state of being, especally not to somebody who I actaully want to know how I am. I usually gloss over everything and convey nothing of substance, or else spend so much time going into depth that the point is lost.

However quite on accident this morning I said something that I think profound enough to bear repeating here for anybody who wants to know how I am.

I am learning to commit my heart to following Christ. It is easy enough to commit my time and activities to His care, but not so easy to trust Him with my heart and it’s desires. It is natural for me to hold onto a little corner that is what I want for myself and hope and pray that my Leader arranges my circumstances so that my heart is satisfied instead of letting Him work directly with my heart.

The realization of how accurate that statement is did not come until after I had sent the letter and re-read it later. I wonder how much easier my life would be if I would actually commit my heart’s desires to Christ’s care … and how much better my attitude would be if I could let go of the faint reservations that still pull at my heart because some part of me is still withheld in my control.

I took one of our rental Jeeps out today for a pre-season trail inspection. I was eager to get out of the office and decided that playing in the snow in a jeep was just the ticket. Of course none of the jeep roads are open for more than a mile or two yet, but it was fun to check.

Having gotten as far up CampBirdRoad as snow would allow, I was sitting in the Jeep talking to my friend when we heard a rumble very much like distant thunder, only instead of dieing off it grew lower. A quick inspection showed a large slide comming off the face of I forget it’s name but here’s a map. The crashing sound of falling rock and snow lasted about ten or twelve seconds and snow was still sliding around half a minute later.

Another exploration up DexterCreek lead got me stuck in the snow. I followed some snow-mobile tracks in for about a quarter mile, which was fine except I fell off them backing out and had to dig out for twenty minutes or so.

All round, a very succesful first-jeep-day for 2005.

2 1/2′ of fresh powder. Why am I not snowboarding?

Waste Management, meet the H2.

Please excuse the mess! I am still a long way for having a finished site, but I figured it was time to have something usable again.

New site features

• The wiki engine has been rebuilt and is now known as QueWiki. Go play in the SandBox.
• Blog engine
• XMLHttp requests for fast browsing!
• Usefull site-search using the Google search API
• AccessKeys for many common navigation features.
• User customizable including stylesheet and javascript toolkits.

You can checkout the SiteRedesign white paper to see if I accomplished my objectives.

Yet to come

• Real stylesheets with real designs
• Photo gallery & wiki picture macro
• Wiki & Blog Comments

Apparently God does not understand the concept of moderation. Last week I felt that our youth ministry was a little flat and prayed for a “little life”. Well apparently God has a surplus on life right now because all of us, leaders and kids alike got a double dose.

Now all that remains is to compose myself.

It’s like this. I have been concerned for some time about the fact that God was taking away some of my closest friends here in Ouray. I don’t have so many of them that I can afford to let God move all of them on to other places.

Over the past week there has been a confusing set of rumors regarding some chap by the name of Ian. I’ve tried to piece things together but the town gossip was so mixed up that I came to entirely the wrong conclusion about who this Ian chap must be.

All that was set straight tonight when I ran into Ian — and he turns out to be a great friend from another time in my life that God moved on and has now sent back.

I thought of something while soaking in the pool this evening stewing over why the world is in such a desperate condition. This goes way back in the day when Adam was crusing the garden. It’s about that tree thing — the tree of the knowledge of good and evil as it’s called.

@(bible Genesis 2:17)

Simple enough as it may seem, God made that tree. I know he created this world and man in it with free will and all that. I also understand that with free will it really doesn’t matter what temptation is lying around or not even lying around — man would still fall. Out of curiosity however, why did God make a tree and use it’s fruit as the trigger? “Oh, and by the way since I already know you will get around to failing eventually there is this really easy way you can do it by eating that thing hanging on that tree over there.” Money doesn’t grow on trees, why should sin?

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So I had a momemtary freak-out tonight when I steped out on the sidewalk on my way home. On the sidewalk across from my office there was a wedding party hanging around talking. Just as I reached for my car door I hear a female voice that sounds like my friend Laura holler, “Hey Bryan”. I turned around to see a chap with long hair and an oversied black coat answer back — to the bride. Now I just happend to have another friend with long hair who always wears and oversided black treachcoat. Durring the next few seconds or so that it took me to determine for sure that this was a different couple I have to admit being entirely confused!

I finnally got a cell phone of my very own working today. This marks a milestone in my life that I have dilligently taken even the most extreeme measures to avoid. Monthly bills with my name on them.

You might think it crazy or amazing that I have gotten to 22 without incurring any monthly bills, but I’ve done it. It hasn’t been cheap and it hasn’t been easy. God only knows what’s next!

If you want to call me to comiserate or congradulate the number is 970-318-8861.

I just got back from Oregon where I took my brother Chase to college at Gutenberg. I feel like a noodle after driving 3k miles! It’s a little weird realizing that I might have a room to myself for the first time since I was 3.