Headed over to TJ's tomorrow to attempt to replace one of the Minivan's ball joints. The obscure little part went bad about three quarters of the way through California on our way back, and the wheel started making a rhythmic 'pthbbbt, pthbbbt' sound as if it were going flat. I pulled over at a gas station where a few homeless people tried to make conversation with me in an attempt to ask for change, but I wasn't in a charitable mood and was on the ground checking the lug nuts and feeling back behind the wheels to make sure the control arms weren't bent on any of them so they eventually got the hint. Then a military looking guy pulled up towing a Jeep on a trailer in a big manly truck so I asked him if he knew anything about ball-joints. He confirmed my diagnosis and told me we'd be all right driving the van back to Washington on a bad ball joint. I was very relieved as it was about 2am by that point and Brandy couldn't find any of the information for the Triple-A membership she'd bought for the trip.

So now I've gotta try and fix it, Lord willing, it sounds pretty do-able and cheap. I've done it before in another life - with Tim Lemoine back in MN - on another vehicle, but memory's pretty hazy.

Just finished having sabbath with the family, It makes me very thankful that I've been able to continue this family tradition with my family, and that the kids have come to look forward to it every week. We turn out all the lights, light a few candles and the menorah as we sing the shema, and then have communion before (sometimes after) we eat dinner. We then generally sing "See ye first" and I'll read Josiah's picture bible to the kids.

Today, since I thought I'd be going over to TJ's tonight to try and fix the van, Brandy had ran out to the store to shop and I was home alone with the kids, something that doesn't happen very often. So I watched them dance and danced with them to some of the "Putomayo Presents" music on my computer, and noticed that Jaelle has a mean salsa step! I took some pictures and wrestled with them all, and then dug out the little Westminster Shorter Catechism and went over two questions with them, "What is the Chief End of Man? (Answer: Man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever) and "What is God?" (Answer: "God is a Spirit, Infinite, Eternal, Unchangeable, In His Being, Wisdom, Power, Holiness, Justice, Goodness, and Truth") Josiah has both of them pretty much down, and Jaelle got close, I was satisfied with Enoch's mumbling attempts to repeat after me. I really like some of the question and answer stuff from that little book, it's edifying for me, and I can't think of a much better definition of "God"

God is a Spirit, Infinite, Eternal, Unchangeable, In His Being, Wisdom, Power, Holiness, Justice, Goodness, and TRUTH!

The kids just finished cleaning their room with a little help and a few spankings from mommy, and Josiah had me read to them from his picture bible, we got up til the Judges. Now Brandy will be reading Narnia to them - they're on the Last Battle, not sure what we'll read them next, I'm thinking the "Tower of Geburah" series by John White, I remember how much I loved those when I was little.

We have the van back!

Its Babylonian captivity is over. I went to write a review of "Premier Transmission" and found quite a few scathing reviews from the past month or so written by other customers/victims. After having read some of the reviews I became much more certain that our situation wasn't a fluke, and felt a lot better about writing a "never go here" review.

Thankfully, TJ & Destiny (friends from work) have been kind enough to lend us their Toyota 4runner (nice car by the way) for the past two weeks, so we've at least been able to get around.

Still trying to get a home fellowship off the ground. The meeting time for HF 'leader training' is Sundays, (2 in a row) 12-4pm. If I were to go, I'd be going to work Sat. night at 9pm, getting off at 7:30am, going to church, staying til 4pm, and going back to work for another 10hr grave shift at 9pm Sun, and starting classes as soon as I got out of work at 7:30am Monday morning. Sooooooo, I don't think I'll be doing that. Lord willing it'll work out so I don't have to, I spoke to Pastor Jack down here at the Wallingford campus and he sympathized with my situation. If they end up not letting us do the HF for that reason, I figure I'll just start a bible study out of the house and start inviting ppl from school/work/apartment.

Pastor Wayne spoke out of Luke today, where Jesus says "A man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions" and goes on to tell the parable about the rich man who wanted to build bigger barns. I felt convicted about that, as I've been developing a buyer's impulse with my student Amazon.com account. It gives me free two-day shipping, and that's been such an incentive that I've found myself searching Amazon for "needs" that qualify for the aforementioned free shipping.

So, instead of being given to Gospel for Asia or needy acquaintances to 'make friends that will welcome me into eternal dwellings', my filthy lucre's been poured out in sacrifice to the inflamed lust aroused by free shipping. Lord forgive me.

I almost went down to the front for prayer after service, but there was only one guy praying and a man who looked even needier than I was in the process of voicing his requests, so I went out and helped Brandy herd the monkeys instead.

Well, now the van has been resurrected, It had died on the way to church, but after last Saturday when it started up, I drove it home and changed the fuel filter, and it's still running! Thank God. Also I used some mix-weld compound to fix the muffler, so now it doesn't sound like a 4-wheeler Harley Davidson anymore.

I'm listening to a couple of MP3's of "Kallistos Ware" An eastern orthodox bishop who's a big voice for the "orthodox" church. I'm listening out of interest because I've known a lot of fellow evangelicals who've gone orthodox, and remember my dad almost did for a while.

Also finished "Baudolino" by Umberto Eco, it was interesting but sad. Made me excited to look into Byzantine History more.

May 16th I'm gonna go sign up for classes @ SPU, that's also Josiah's birthday, so I hope to get it done and get out of there quick and easy.

We found out that apparently our lease is a year and 28 days, not just a year as we'd thought, so we have to wait to move for another month or so now. I was looking forward to moving sooner, but Rom 8:28 is still in full effect, so I trust it's for good reason.
I've finished memorizing Titus chapters 1&2 as part of the "Men In Turn" group @ Calvary Chapel South. This is the first time I've memorized two consecutive chapters of Scripture, (not the first time I've tried) and I was really happily surprised how easy it was! I guess in part it's because it's an assignment that I've been given, and there's an expectation of an authority (A Pastor) that I'll have a certain amount memorized every two weeks. It's sad that my own desire isn't enough to get me to memorize this quickly, that I need accountability to get it done, but it seems like it's like that with everything. For the past month or so, I've been working out and running with a friend from work every Monday and Tuesday morning - which I very likely wouldn't be doing if I didn't have someone who expected me to be there. I guess that accountability is like a means by which, If we're really serious about any sort of discipline, we'll reinforce our decisions. I remember when I first truly was saved, God impressed on me that I couldn't just lay around and expect God to sanctify me on the sly, If I wanted my eyes to be right, I had to get rid of my Maxim magazines, if I wanted to break out of my introspection and love people, I had to force myself to talk to people. If I was going to testify to Jesus Christ, I had to set myself up, by doing things like scripturally themed art pieces for school assignments to have a chance to explain them.

Well, I'm at work, and my break's up, and I guess that's all the thinking time I have.

Drinking tea with lemon, and gauging whether or not I feel good enough to run this morning, or if this mini-cold will cripple my monday morning exercise routine yet again. So far, so good, I think the tea is helping.
Just read an essay my little brother wrote on perception, it's really good. I'm surprised, he never really wrote anything before - at least anything I remember enjoying. But this essay was very clear (clearer, at least, than my writing) and reminded me of Kierkegaard's essay "The Crowd is Untruth" which I recommend (not on authority though, because that would defeat the purpose).
Our van is in questionable health too, it stalled out on us on the way to church, but our brothers & sisters in Christ rolled up their sleeves and pushed us to the church parking lot after service, gave us a ride home, and helped me look at it this past Saturday. But by then it was too late, since on Saturday it started up just fine and tried to act as if nothing happened, but it's not fooling me. I know it's biding its time til I'm tooling down I5 in rush hour traffic, and then *putter putter wheeze croak*-it'll give up the ghost. So I'm not going to even try and drive it til my weekend, which starts tomorrow morning.
But I replaced the fuel filter all by myself, to feel manly.