My desk is alive with the sound of music

I've done it. I've completed a task that Ive been working on for months. You're going to think this is dumb. In a way I think it's dumb. But I still feel like I've accomplished something.

Back in October I decided to copy all the songs on my ipod to my computer at work. I've got every CD that I own on my ipod so that's a ton of songs. 2756 to be exact. Since then I've been listening to my songs alphabetically every day. When I'd come in to work I'd hit play and any time I'd leave me desk I'd hit pause. I started this on October 24th and finished yesterday. That's a long time and a lot of songs. Like I said, I can acknowledge that this is really pretty lame. But it was just something to do to make the day go by quicker.

But, as with everything this taught me something. Maybe this list of things I learned will help you learn something to.

1.) I own a lot of CD's. Sadly 90% of them are from the mid 90's when I had more $ than sense. This makes for a pretty crappy CD collection. Do I really need every "Audio Adrenaline" CD?

2.) Being a member of a CD club is really stupid. Yes you might get 50 cd's for a penny, but the agreement after that really screws you. I think that's how I ended up with "Andy Griffith sings favorite Hymns". If you've fallen into this trap, be sure to mail back anything you don't want promptly.

3.) Listening to songs alphabetically can be more difficult than you'd imagine. I wasn't aware until Early December that I owned 12 different versions of "Open The Eyes Of My Heart". That hour of music almost drove me insane.

4.) Too many worship song begin with "I".

5.) Most CD's only have 2 or 3 good songs. The rest are just filler.

6.) After a while all of Garth Brooks' songs sound the same.

7.) Best CD in my collection for listening to at work may be "Queen's Greatest Hits". Worst CD is definately "Hymnz in Da House" Hymns set to club music. Imagine the Roxsbury guys listening to "It is well" with a beat. wow, that is awful!

8.) I like songs that tell a story. "This here's a song about two sets of J..)

9.) I've bought less than 15 cd's in the past 2 years. Half of those were by Johnny Cash. I'm not tired of him yet.

10.)There have been too many covers of the song "Desperado".

Well, I've accomplished my task. Listened to all my songs. From "100 years from Now" by Huey Lewis to "Your Song" by Sir Elton John. Now what am I supposed to do at work? Actually work?!?

Nightmares & Dreamscapes

So I had a very bizarre dream last night.

I really want to go see the movie Cloverfield and I'm sure that had something to do with this dream. So here it is. Maybe you can help me figure out what it means.

In the dream my family lives in New York City. It's just another normal day, we get up take Ethan to daycare in the heart of downtown and go to work. I get to work and find out there is a large Godzilla like monster attacking the city. I quickly leave work and run through the streets, fighting the crowds, to pick up Ethan (I'm not sure where Gavin was during all of this.) After getting him, we find out the monster is only blocks away, we can see him towering over the skyline. So Ethan and I make our way towards home, on foot. Luckily the National guard is there firing at the monster providing us cover. I pick up an automatic rifle and begin running backwards, holding Ethan, firing at the Monster. This only draws his full attention towards us. I guess the tanks firing at him didn't compare to the threat from a large slow man and his 3 yeard old son. Anyway, he is quickly gaining on us and we know we are about to get stepped on. We reach home just in the nick of time, Kristi has arranged for a military helicopter to pick us up there. Ethan and I hop in and fly away barely missing the reach of the monster. The End. Here's where it gets really weird. I had this dream a 2nd time, within the dream knowing the outcome and not worrying at all because I already knew everything would be okay. I even gave the gun to Ethan at one point so he could shoot at the monster while I focused on getting us home.

Then I dreamed this same thing a 3rd time. This time though, when I left work I couldn't find the daycare. It was as if I had never been there before. There are people running frantically everywhere and I'm trying to stop them and ask directions to a daycare. aAound me people are yelling "run for your lives" "we're all going to die" and I'm stopping people to say "Do you know how to get to 3rd Street Daycare?" The dream ended when I looked up towards the monster heading my way and he was just standing there laughing at me.

Anyone care to interpret this dream?

Oh death, won’t you spare me over til another year?

Death surrounds us. Today I feel almost choked by it.

Saturday night I learned of the death of Bronner Burgess, the 2 year old son of radio host Rick Burgess, of The Rick & Bubba Show. Now, I've never met Rick or any of his family. But it's bizarre how I feel like I know them. I've been listening to that show daily for more than 10 years. They feel like family. Hearing that news really made me feel like I had lost a family member. Also, being a father now, I can't fathom the sorrow that would come from losing one of my boys. I've been amazed at the way the show and his famly has given God glory in all of this. What an awesome testimony to what a relationship with Christ can mean to you.

Considering that news, I've been strangely affected by the deaths of two celebrities. I heard recently about Brad Renfroe & just today Heath Ledger was found dead. (I was so exzcited about his upcoming role in The Dark Night. I wonder if production had finished?))I can't help but think of their families. Yes, the circumstances were much different. It appears they each brought their problems onto themsleves, but they are both someone's cihld, someone's father. I feel sorrow for their families and what they are going through.

God, show them your glory.

Best doggone dog in the west (west alabama)

Sadness. My dog is gone.

I love dogs, grew up with one living in the house, sleeping in my bed wth me. Kristi does not love dogs. It took me years to convince her we needed one. 4 years ago we made a bet on the gender of her sister's first child. I won that bet (shout-out to my nephew Will!) As a result of that wager I won the right to get a dog. I didn't cash in on that bet until a couple years ago. Almost two years ago Mally joined our family. She is (was?) a mix Great Pyrenese/ German Shepherd. She was huge. Could stand on her back feet and look me in the eye. Unfortunately her size mixed with her puppyness, made for some rough play when she was a puppy and so she didn't make friends with Kristi or Ethan very easily.

Since we don't have a fence, she was a chain dog. She would stay on her chain during the day and at night I would let her off to run wild in the neighborhood. After a few months of this I learned that every night she was going across the street and playing with Uncle Danny's dog Smokey. Apparently they were the best of friends. Smokey is a boy. Malley is a girl. But they've both been fixed so nothing inappropriate was going on. Sadly we learned a few months ago that Smokey is going blind and it had been decided he was going to be "put down". Feeling really bad about this, Uncle Danny decided to let him off his chain for a couple last nights of freedom. And of course Smokey came to our house to play for those nights. Mally was so happy having a friend to play with at our house. Then it happened.

Thanksgiving night, I let Mally off the chain so that she and Smokey could run a play together in the field. That was the last time I saw her. She's never been one to run away before, but I wasn't too worried when we didn't see either of them the next day or two. And actually I had given up all hope after a week or so. Then a Christmas miracle, a couple days after Christmas Smokey was found at the end of our road. Yeah! Surely Mally was somewhere close as well. Ethan and I went on a Malley hunt. Taking flyers to all of our neighbors, asking them if they'd see a huge white dog running around. And we were given some hope. A couple of them had seen Smokey and another dog in the weeks prior, but only Smokey recently. But alas, Mally has still not been found. And what's even worse, Smokey has not been eating for weeks. He circles our house looking for Malley. We're all afraid that something happened to Mally and that Smokey is in mourning. I guess I am too.

reactions to blogging

It has been very interesting to see people's reactions to my recent blogs. I've learned two things. First,people enjoy reading blogs, but don't usually want very personal information. The reactions to my honesty and openness in my blog about weight loss has been strange. I've had 3 people tell me they felt uncomfortable reading it. Maybe too much info? I don't care. I know it's going to help me to stick with it knowing a lot of people are "in the know". (so far I've lost 11.5 lbs, But I did get a haircut so that might have helped. =)

Also I've learned if you blog about being mad at someone, but remain silent about who it is, a lot of people will say "Is it me?" People are funny that way. Maybe I should blog next about the person that I'm mad at because they owe me a lot of money. If you think it's you, go ahead and pay me what you think you owe and I'll forgive you for being indebted to me this long.