Apple

Finally I have definitive proof that Apple has set out to make their products a status symbol so that people will pay more for Apple products that do less than what the competition is capable of.

I am Rich

Someone developed a screensaver for the iPhone and the iTouch that is priced at $1000. What does it do, you ask? Cure cancer? Solve world hunger? Give it's owner the ability to fly? No. It displays a glowing red gem, so that all your friends will know how rich you are. I'm just waiting for a rogue software developer to start selling the same thing for $3 a pop.

Has a sandcastle ever gotten the best of you?

One evening that I was in Oregon, I decided to go for a run along the beach. I headed down to the beach and started running along the edge of the water. It was high tide, so there was only a thin line of damp sand between the waves and the really dry sand. I ran right along the edge of the water, using the excuse that the sand is the most firm there, while it was really just because it was most fun. Within the first couple minutes I came to a huge sandcastle. Just as I approached it, a big wave came up and around it so that I had to either wait or run around to my right on the really dry sand. I decided to wait since I didn't want to get my shoes sandy. After a couple seconds it looked like the water was only a half inch or so deep in front of the sandcastle and so I went for it.

It was precisely at this moment that I discovered where all the sand for the sandcastle had come from: there was a hole about two feet deep right in front of it that I managed to skillfully locate by leaping directly into it. My right shoe/leg got soaked and I got sand and water all over me, but I wasn't really cold, and had just started my run, so I just decided to keep going, running through the shallows splooshing and splashing. As I went along the whole turn of events struck me as absolutely hilarious, so I started laughing at myself as I went along. I felt like I had been on the discovery channel, "Little did this jogger know that moments ago, local children had just completed a clever trap." So I continued along the beach, sometimes on wet sand, sometimes splashing through a foot of water. I started passing some people and got quite a bit of enjoyment out of the strange looks I got as I ran through the waves with a big silly grin on my face.

Camp, In Review,

Was wonderful. I was at Lake Ellen for three weeks. In contrast to two years ago, I was a counselor instead of an Area Director/Counselor. So much better! The first week I had 11-13 year olds, the second week I had 9-11 year olds, and the third week I had high schoolers. I had to adjust quite a bit, but each week brought its own challenges and joys. In those three weeks, two kids in my cabin recommitted themselves to Christ and two others prayed to receive Christ for the first time. It was thrilling to be working on the front lines encouraging kids to pursue God and righteousness and to be reconciled to Him. The staff were also amazing. If circumstances were different, I'd room with any of the guys that I worked with in a split second and whatever the non-creepy equivalent of close friendship is with girls would be the same. I'm really praying that God will make a way for me to be able to spare the time and money to be there for all summer next year.

Lake Ellen is probably my favorite place on earth. Nowhere else have I been so challenged to grow and seen God do such amazing things around me.

Sunset at Loon Lake


Derek Gladstone and Myself


Roughly the Trailblazers' team, from left, Derek,
Me, Joie, Rochelle, Andrew, and Sarah

Blogging Time!

I just caught up on reading all my friends' blogs. Okay, well, all of Megan's new posts. Apparently she's biking around doing sweet music stuff, which looks like fun. But you don't read my blog to hear about what my friends have blogged about. If you want to read Megan's blog go here. And you should. But anyways.

One of the things that I thought about in Zambia was about how many clothes I have, and that I should get rid of the ones that I don't wear, because someone else could probably use them. Over the last few days I went through my clothes and got rid of a bunch. I started with T-shirts. I discovered that when I hunted down every last one and counted them, I had over forty--Mildly disgusting to me. So I got ride of twenty of them or so, sweet! I also got rid of a bunch of other things, so now the only clothes that I have are ones that I'll actually wear, and I won't need a U-haul to get them down to Champaign in the fall.

One of the back speakers in my car blew out, which made me sad. I talked to Brian Spangler about it and he just happened to have speakers the right size and a receiver sitting in his basement that he wants to get rid of. Or did he just happen to have them? Hmmm. In any case, assuming that that works out, I will be one happy driver.

I read an article today on BBC talking about how the US needs to end its love affair with the car. Unfortunately, my love affair is just beginning :P.

That is the end of my random thoughts and a little bit about what I've been up to. Hope you enjoyed it.

Graduated

It's true. A Bachelor's of Science in engineering physics (should ep be capitalized? guess it shows that you still don't know everything after college) has now been earned by THIS. I also have a car now, which is cool. It's a '97 Saab 900s, nice and small and sporty (although no turbo).

The last week of class was the IV Senior send-off gathering. It was a lot of fun to think back on all the good times that I've had over the last four years. I didn't know until a couple minutes before that I had a chance to soapbox for a few minutes so I didn't say much when it was my turn. If I'd had more time to think about it, I'd have said something about spending one's time wisely. That the biggest thing that I regret about graduating is all the people that I know that I haven't had time to really get to KNOW. I wish I could be around next fall to welcome the new students and continue to lead a Bible study and be a witness in the EP department. But that responsibility now falls on those that are still there.

As classes and projects wore down, I had a little urge to just wander around campus and think about my college career. I didn't do it because I just didn't quite have the motivation to do it by myself. But then on Tuesday after I had everything packed up I went to noon prayer (since Tuesday was the day that I had noon free this semester) and we went on a prayer walk. So I had a chance to wander past the student's center, the PAC, Otts, and McGregor, the buildings that I spent the most time in while I was a student. I had nothing to do but think and pray and listen to the prayers of others and it was great. With each building I was able to think about all the things that I had done and the people that I knew and pray about those things. It was great.

My mind is leaking into the keyboard

It's official.

I accepted the teaching assistantship from U of I at Urbana-Champaign. Last week I was getting tired of waiting to hear from U of M, so I started moving forward with going to UIUC out of spite :D. I emailed the Grad InterVarsity chapter to see if anyone was looking for a roommate for next fall. My biggest priority in my future was finding a good Christian community to join immediately, and I figured having a Christian roommate(s) would be a good start. The next day I heard back from a physics grad student whose roomie is graduating. He's currently a small group coordinator for their chapter (which is what I did here at Platteville for a year, now I'm back to being a sg leader), and has a fairly inexpensive two-bedroom apartment. It's less expensive than other places because his landlord doesn't advertise much, i.e. I wouldn't have found it otherwise :D. He said it's big enough to host a small group Bible study, so I'm pretty sure that I'm going to land in the middle of a good Christian community if it works out. Then there's some other little things, like its unfurnished, but he has enough furniture for the living room, so all I need is a bed, dresser, and desk, which is what I just happen to already have.

Four hours after I heard about that, the university of minnesota finally got back to me and offered me a TA there, but I didn't even think about it seriously. Maybe because I had a cold, maybe because I don't have time to second guess myself, and maybe because the stipend they offered me was $17/month less than what UIUC offered :P. Actually, it's probably because UIUC's EE grad program is considered to be one of the best in the world (comparable to MIT and Stanford) and I just needed a little extra momentum to choose the better of two very good choices.

Other ways that God has been leading me to UIUC is that next weekend there is a Tau Beta Pi conference on that campus (TBP is an engineering honors society). Since I'm a member, I can go for free and get to see the campus, possibly attend Grad IV's large group meeting, and possibly finalize housing.

Final random thought of this post: I'm not actually that gung ho to get a masters degree. While I do enjoy my major, part of me would rather be a pastor than an engineer. I'm doing this because this is where God has sent me. He gifted me in this area and has given me enough patience to get some more schooling and that's all I know. Honestly though, I feel like I'm building a resume similar to the one that Paul lists in Phillipians 3. I'm really just waiting for the day God directs me to give all this engineer stuff up for the sake of his kingdom. Maybe that'll never happen, but I'll be ready for it if it ever does.

What the Future May Hold

Spring break is in about a week and because of one professor in particular and work I'm going to be quite busy until then. Yesterday I had a few hours free and decided to get a jump start on a difficult and potentially time consuming lab project that's due next Wednesday. After only about three hours of work I got part one (of two) working properly and was able to check off with my professor. Let me tell you, I felt pretty good about getting that done, so when I ran into some friends who were going downtown for cheap tacos I went along and did some relaxing, which was amazing. Around this time I started thinking "Man, the only way my day could be better is if I had an email from a grad school or employer waiting for me."

I called UMN and UIUC about a week and a half ago, and they both said I should be notified by the middle of March, so in the last week or so I've been reminded a few times of filling out those cereal box offers when I was little (like <13 years old). I collected all the UPC symbols then laboriously addressed an envelop and sent it off. And began to wait the 8-12 decades it takes for them to process it and send the toy to me. By the time it got within a few weeks of the predicted time period, I'd start wondering every day before the mail came, "Maybe today is the day. It PROBABLY isn't, but wouldn't it be cool if it was?" And I'd get all excited and then disappointed until the day it finally arrived.

Which brings me back to the present. I've been checking my email even more obsessively than usual because every time it crosses my mind I think "Maybe they sent the email today/this morning (/in the last five minutes). Yesterday after thinking that my day could only get better if I got an email, I actually didn't check my email until much later because I didn't want to expect my day to be THAT amazing. When I got home we had a ton of people in the house for the Platteville Safe Spring Break Party Challenge, so it wasn't until 10:30ish that I looked carefully enough at my email to realize that I had an important email.

The electrical engineering department at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne accepted me in to their program and offered me a "half-time" teaching assistantship (which means I get free tuition and money to live on in exchange for working as a ta). When I could breath again, my first impulse was to show it to my roommates (weaving around the 4 million people that still populated our house), call my parents and tell them, and show it to a couple other people that were at the party.

When I was thinking about whether or not to blog about it, my first thought was that this is kind of an impersonal way to tell some of my good friends, and I'd rather tell them personally. But then I decided that next to the people immediately around me, my closest friends read my blog, and so I decided to go for it.

I'm still not going to UIUC for certain, or even grad school for certain, but I now have a concrete option for the next couple years of my life. Before now all I had was potential, which doesn't put food on the table :).

Yesterday It Was Spring

And now it's winter again.

Phooey











-the end

Had a Jehovah's Witness stop by

Yesterday morning a Jehovah's witness stopped by and caught me in between classes. He was a bigger guy and looked like he was in his 40's or so. I had a few minutes so I invited him in.

He talked for a few minutes how its hard to "find peace" in this world with everything that's going on. I'd say more about what he said, but he pretty much just repeated and elaborated on that idea. Then he read Isaiah sixty five verses twenty-something. It was a prophecy about a time of peace and prosperity returning. His point in that was that many people don't have that today. He said he was going around encouraging people to look into the Bible to find peace.

I sat quietly and listened, resisting the urge to grab my Bible that was sitting on the table a couple feet away from me and waited for him to finish his thoughts. When I had a moment I said that I don't even look for peace in this world because it can't be found. I have peace through my relationship with Jesus Christ, by living for him. With that he basically said "good for you, its too bad lots of people aren't like that" and left.

What struck me as odd was that I didn't even know whether he was a Jehovah's Witness or Mormon. I figured it out because the literature that he offered me was watchtower, which google told me is Jehovah's Witness. My thought afterwords was "Wow, even these guys have gotten pansy in the way they share what they believe." I mean the guy no disrespect. He clearly meant well, but his approach was really weak sauce.

Not much activity here

Most of my blogging energy has been directed towards our Zambia team blog so check in there if you miss me :D.