Ah nuts

Realized why I can't find my practice weapon for sword drills.....It's in San Fransisico! I'm hoping to get it back on monday/tuesdayso that I can pick up practice again. Running through my drills are pretty relaxing for me so I look foward to them. Even if it freaks out the nieghbors. In other news, I said goodbye to Jen today, altough I hope to see her before she leaves. SHe going on thursday for simpson university, leaving just a few people here in fresno. I miss my fellow networkers alot and keep hoping to see them again during winter break. Mo's planning on coming back to California during winter break, so I know I'll see a lot of them then. In other good news, Emmy got a kick-arse job and I'm praying that she enjoys it :)

First week wrapup

What a wonderful, stressful week. I managed to live through my first few days as a teacher with only a few stressouts. The work is incredibly rewarding, but the number of expectations is huge. New suggestion and ideas keep finding their way over to my position, but there are just too many for me to keep track of. I'm also working hard on the lesson plans, which will be a modification of the previous years curriculum. This seemed like a good idea, until I started hearing parental complaints about last years curriculum. Now I'm doing my best to change some of the basics around, but it means rewriting most of the lessons.

I've never been in a job that contains so much pressure to perform. I'm handling it well enough so far, but I could really use some constructive stress relief. Which I probably do once I figure out what that entails......

Off the moaning and groaning, tough, I did have some good moments at school. I have at least one student who is really excited about the computer lab and a few others that show passing interest. I've set up email addresses for the teachers and met some of the volunteers who will be assisting or whom I will be assisting. The environment is also very nice, as faith is displayed openly and without reservation, a marked difference from my previous professions.

If anyone reads this, please pray for stress realize and for guidance in not allowing this stress to affect others around me. Also please pray that I am guided to teach the children properly. I know I can make it if God wants me to.

Inservice Day

We had an inservice day here at Kerman christian schools. I got a chance to meet a lot of my fellow teachers and discuss the coming school year. The whole group is rather friendly, altough I detect some latent power struggles. I figure my postion hopefully will keep me on the good side of such things, however. We had CPR and 1st aid training, which was a lot of fun. We were given mannequins with swappable faces to practice on. Thankfully, noone managed to break any of our 'victims' and they all made a complete non-living recovery :) I have also been asked to help out on the hulme lake camping trip, which would be a good oppurtunity to get to know the kids, but again, I am weary on how I am suppsed to act as both consouler and teacher. There are a lot of challanges ahead in this new job, but I intend to meet them as God trained me - no, designed me, to do. By confronting the problem head-on and with utter conviction. May he guide me 'cause I have'nt a clue what I'm doing:)

In other news, my father, after several lokng years of searching...has finnaly obtained an IT job with TUlare County. It's a well paying postion and he's pretty estatic about the chance to work in a new enviroment. I guess I'll have to train him to dress like me now :)

Prayer needed....

What a night :p ! I attended bible study for the first time in a while (couldn't attended while at networkers) In addition to a nice exercise in literary worship, we were supposed to discuss how the year ahead and what the college group would be doing. There was a lot of positive discussion on group events, the possibility of a seekers group on Sunday nights and a lot of talk about college leadership. It has been real amazing to discuss such possibilities and only real possible through the hard work of our youth pastor and the influx of college freshmen.

The part that was tough was the discussion of the college Sunday school group. This is where things got ugly. First, some background:

The College Sunday school class has had a long history of being brought up and shut down. When I attended orginanly it went from a summer class of 10 or so to a fall class of 1...I was the only college student who didn't leave Fresno to go to school or go to adult bible study. Despite my best efforts to keep the program alive until summer, the program died out. After a second attempt that didn't last very long the program stayed dormant for quite a while and I gave up. A third attempt was headed up with a rather active man in my church who teamed up with my sister to slowly grow a small bible study group. While this continued great for 2 years, the group has been at a crossroads where it needs strong leadership to cotninue growing.

unfortunately the question was proposed to the bible study as to what should be done about the Sunday school. I respect and enjoy many of the people at the bible study, but most of them are just too hard core to be hanging out in a mostly beginner-level Sunday school class, but rather have joined the adult class for the more advanced theological concepts. Which is of course a great thing for a mature Christian, but it means that only a small handful that attend Sunday school attend the bible studies. Rather than fix the issue or include the Sunday school class as part of the expanding college program, the general consues was that the Sunday school program was a destined failure and should not be allowed to continue. Primarily on the idea that most college age Christian should attend the adult classes. This is our last seeker-based college event, the only avenue for college age young Christians to become part of the college group. I fear without it, we will stop growing as a group, relying instead on the high school group to find younger Christians and send them to us.

sometime next week this issue will be debated and decided. I need prayer to help resolve this issue and to keep me and my sister calm as we remember that God's will, not yours, must predominate. Even if it means the loss of this program again.

No Mo......

First day at church since the networker program ended. It feels so weird to see the little kids heading off to Sunday school without me. I'm going to miss our lessons with the kids or even the worship times. To make matters even more bumming, most of the networkers will be gone in a couple weeks heading off to their various destinations. Ryan, Matt and Me wil still be hanging around, with Em visiting when she can. Em and Moe have been real close friends and it's gonna suck not see them again. Not being able to make fun or have fun of Emmy, Jen or Hayley gonna make things a little boring. Not to mention no longer hanging out with Eric or Andrea. At least I'm luckier than some, a few of us like Moe won't see any of the other networkers for a few months.

The other bumming part was seeing Maureen off. While we'll still keep in touch over email and IM, it was a little hard to see her go. I can't believe I'm gonna have to attend 5 more goodbyes.

Note to Moe: that was a cute goodbye with my windshield wipers btw

Color Her Mine?

I had a date today with Maureen. It was a pretty amazing day and I'll spare you all the details, but we both had a really good time and I think I made an impression (a good one too, no screaming or running away!) Some Highlights of the day:

1. Took Her to Color Me Mine, a little paint-your-own-pottery shop in riverpark. She was estatic and painted a very cup with a verse on it. (I should've taken a picture, but I was too distracted). I painted a nice, if odd turtle. It was a lot of fun to see Maureen in her "natural" enviroment and to swap talk back and forth.

2. We raided the World Market store for soda and were kidding around when we meet our sunday school teacher for the college group :) We had a real good laugh about being 'caught' on our date.

3. We then hung out at em's dorm room helping her move in. Not exactly romantic, but it was nice to be able to hang out with good friends as a couple. After having to keep my mouth shut for so long, it felt good to be able to talk about how the date went.

Maureen is really an amazing girl, her strength and beauty during crsis is pretty admirable. Her faith is pretty hot too. I'm gonna miss her when she leaves for LAX tommrow

hullo new life

wow...not a networker any more. :(

I spent the morning hanging out with my ex-coworkers and having fun despite some stomach issues. (I was sick and then made it worse with a bad sandwhich, which, while being bad, tasted great.) We had a lt of fun, just goofing off and terrozing each other. I then went to Zach kneaper's birthday party, where he and I had a blast running around like action hero's shooting and getting shot a few dozen times apiece. Niether one of us scored as high as we normaly do, but we scored some shots on the arena champion, so I was happy. The rest of the night was playing Zach's latest present, Munchkin, which is a pretty darn fun game. I got a huge kick out of using the "Boots of Butt kicking" I've got to pick up a version for myself.

Thursday Night meeting

woah.....real emotional day...

I was the official end of the program today. We got together with all of the host families, advisors and Net team staff to talk about our summer and swap memories. There was a bit of crying as it became so real that we wouldn't be seeing as much of each other after this. I even felt a little teary-eyed as we layed hands on each other and prayed. There was a lot of things said about each of us and the work we've done over the summer. Once again, the comments about me seemed to be opposites of each other. Some comments are about of serious and studied I am, while others referred to a spontaneous and goofy nature. I suppose they're both a little true, but it was a little odd. When the meeting was over, several of us got together for one last hurrah by camping out on the Norman's front lawn. It was nice to be able to end the program our way: with one last little laugh with the church community. It was especially cute that Dave Norman, our boss, tepeed the tents.

I'm gonna miss my teammates alot. I've never met people my own age so passionate for God. Several of these people have been role models for the type of Christian I want to be. I don't know what I'll do without My Girls (Jen, Hayley and Em) or the rest of team to hang out with. These are without a doubt the best friends I've had in a long time. I'm especially gonna miss Em and Moe, who have helped me with several issues in my past. They now know more about me than any other human living and they've really kept my trust. These fall is going to be so boring without these guys!

Fun at the Goodels

This is crazy. As we enter the last week of the networker program, all the networkers are eager to spend as much time with each other as possible. The first event of the day was our last bubble study, where we presented the gospel Message in a pretty unique way:

We started by choosing a volunteer from the audience...the volunteer was then told that they would be asked a questions; if they got it right, they would receive a prize, but if they got it wrong they would be hit in the face with a huge cream pie.

After our volunteer accepted the terms they got there question:

What is the Definitation of substitutionary Atonement?

Our poor volunteer didn't have a clue, they began to sweat as the timer counted down and the pie got bigger and bigger....7...6...5...4..

Then Em(one of the networkers) sprung up and begged to take the volunteered place. After a little deliberation, it was agreed that she could.

A pity she didn't know the answer either.

We pied her pretty good and explained to the kids that Jesus had taken our punishment like Em had taken the punishment for the volunteer. It was a great lesson because it really spoke to the kids and because we got to pie someone:)

After that the networkers got together to talk and hang our at the Goodel home. Normally the Goodel's location in Kerman doesn't allow for them to have networkers over very often, but being a host family has given us some excellent opportunities to hang out with them. I stayed until about 12:00 AM, but the others still hung out until 2:00 AM. Life is going to be soooo boring without these kids.

Fun at the Konrads

We just could'nt leave well enough alone could we? We got together at the Konrad's home in order to hang out and watch the movie Labrinth. I enjoyed myself immensely, altough Maureen evidently thought it was boring. (A surprise, since it usually artsy people that get the biggest kick out of it.) Still not done, we then planned a spontaneous dinner party complete with placesettings and waffles. It was a real cute scene and the konrad's cracked up when they saw it. The best part came when Maureen showed her piece-de-resistance, a video montage done to gospel music that was pretty amazing. I can't belive she managed to get her hands on so many amazing pictures. We finshed the night by watching the video of Jen getting dunked in the pool during her birthday :) I then gathered up my things and attempted to leave.

Of course, it could'nt jsut end there.... I evidently left my suit jacket on the top of the car when I drove off, so Jen had to call me and have me come back. After I got lost on my way back, Jen called me again just as I was pulling up:

"Hey Vernon, you coming or not?"

"I'm already here"

"No way, I don't see you at all"

"I turned off my light because the police helicopter is spotlighting me"

"There's no helicopter! Where are you.....(pause) Oh my God! There's a helicopter outside guys! Come check it out!"

Jen evidently had been looking out the window and failed to notice the skywatch helicopter that was scanning the neighborhood. I had a good laugh at her expense. Sorry-ish Jen!

Wedding Bells

Ding Dong the bachelors gone! Iley and Bree got married today :) This would be the first wedding I'd have attended where I knew the bride and groom closely, so I was excited. All the networkers were invited, so we all donned our best and proceeded to celebrate the event. The wedding itself was pretty formal, wit a little too much ceremony for my tastes....I could've sworn they were married twice. They were of course very happy and it may stand as the only time quiet-mannered Bree has spoke louder than her other half.

The reception was a lot of fun too, we hung out with the Goodale kids and took pictures. Hayley and Em found some unexpected friends and I wore my loafers (and liked it, but don't tell the girls that!). All-in-All we had a blast and I feel very lucky to have been a part of this event.

Engrish

LOL...somebody evidently did'nt like my last post. They left what I assume is a disparing comment, so I babelfished it. Now I can't stop laughing:

Orginal COmment: (warning may contain cusswords)

tu pinche blog esta del pito, eres una mierda de persona, muerete bastardo,

BabelFish:

*your kitchen boy blog this of the whistle, you are a bastard excrement of person, muerete,*

I am so gonna call someone "you kitchen boy of this whistle".....

Arghhh! A trap!

I have some evil friends....Here I was, innocent ol' me, thinking that I'd be able to shop at the thirft stores with some friends, little suspecting the plans they had for me. Oh no, we were'nt there for wedding supplies(my buddies Iley and Bree are getting married) or even to find me a new pair of slacks. Oh no, they wanted to Civilize me. That's right, polo shirts and sandals. I now own four nice shirts and a hideous striped shirt. I also somehow ended up with a huge pair of sandals and loafers. Loafers! next, they'll be taking my MREs and shiny swords away.