ramblings of a wannabe rockstar

As many of you may recall, I had the opportunity last year to join 13 others from my church on a week-long mission trip to Nicaragua (I blogged about that trip here). Stated simply, it was the most amazing thing I have ever been a part of. From the moment I started preparing to the moment I arrived at home upon return, and the weeks and months following, I experienced my God in a way that transcended everything I have come to know about who He is in my life up to that point.

This “God experience” made itself most evident time after time in the way I came to know Him and his work through the prayers of myself and everyone who participated with me in that regard.

In August I have the opportunity to once again join a team, this time to Honduras. After my time in Nicaragua last year, I can’t deny myself this opportunity.

I have been encouraged to send support letters to friends and family to supplement my personal contributions to this trip. This year I need to raise $1200. Genesis Metro Church is hosting a golf tournament on June 14 which will go toward the funding of all of us going on the trip.

Of course, the prayer I mentioned earlier will go an immensely long way.

Having participated in this kind of a trip once before, I have a bit of a better idea as to what to expect, but I am approaching this time slightly differently.

Last year I needed to rely on God. If I were to go back and recount the odds that were lined up against me, I would bore you with the details. But there were some very specific ways that I needed him to show up. I leaned on the hope of His provision quite liberally in some very specific ways.

This time, I am opening my eyes and ears to what God wants to show me. I don’t particularly have a laundry-list of “provisionary needs” like I did this time last year. Instead I am expecting Him to work however He chooses and I am waiting to see how it goes.

I love this stuff!

As I did last year, I will be blogging my way through the preparation period, journaling while there, and posting my reflections upon my return. I hope that you will read along.

I mailed my support letters to several people late last week so if I have your mailing address, you will receive them shortly. For those of you who may not have received it in the mail, feel free to download a the letter here.

Thanks for reading. Stay tuned for more.

I’m headin’ out in a bit to spend some time with family and friends in Southern Cali for a few days. There’s a particular part about this trip, really the primary reason I’m going, that has been a long time coming. The culmination of a personal victory of sorts. I’ll write more about that later. But for now…I’m pretty stoked about getting burning up some well-earned vacation time. Raquel gets to join me tomorrow.

Despite all the junk I’ve been giving this season for as bad as it was, at least the right guy won. Congratulations to David Cook.

That’ll do it for this season.

Well, wrapping up what has up to now been nothing short of a crap season, last night has to be, for what it was, one of the best final 2 in show history. DA vs. DC. The whole boxing theme was pretty gay, but well done. Cook was good, but Archuleta blew him away in every way last night. Judging purely on performance values alone, putting aside tastes and personal preferences, Archuleta should win this thing.

That said, I think Cook wins. I guess we’ll see what happens.

Technorati Tags: american idol, david cook, david archuleta, season 7, simon cowell, randy jackson, paula abdul

What is it about the ability to post bulletins on MySpace that causes so many people to post dumb surveys ad nauseum…many of which have the same questions with the same answers by the same people every time?

As I scroll down the first page of my blog, I notice that 30% of my posts contain some kind of John Mayer related content. Here I go posting some more. I can’t help it. I think the guy is a genius.

I pretty much am counting the days until this gets released.

The JM ballwashing will cease soon. Maybe.

Today is the official 3-month mark of the start of my Weight Watchers. As of my trip to the scale this morning, I’m .3lbs short of 30 pounds lost. This puts me at 237lbs. My first goal was to lose 26lbs by May 15. I reached that goal last Wednesday.

On Saturday, I will begin a regmented workout that I’m hoping will expedite the weight loss process. My next official goal is 24 more pounds (from 241). My next personal goal is to be at 230 by the time I leave for my little California vacation two weeks from today.

Other notes: all of my pants and most of my shorts are too big for me. I now wear my belt tighter then ever. It’s enough to the point that I’ve got about 3″ of extra belt past the first belt loop. It used to not make it to the loop.

*becoming less and less of a fatty*

Okay, so I finally caught up on this week’s run of AI. I want that two hours back.

You’re given the entire catalog of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame songs and those are the best eight you can come up with? Seriously?

David Cook is good. Not sure if he can beat that squirrelly batboy Archuleta, but he should. Syesha is cut out for Broadway. I enjoy her, but she’s not AI quality. And Castro: man…that dude stayed on this show way too long. I enjoyed him, but good Lord, he sure did know how to screw things up.

Not that I care too much anymore, considering how this season went, but it should be interesting to see how the next two weeks go.