I got back from Mexico last Saturday. I had enough time to get caught up at work and I’m leaving for San Antonio tomorrow.

Tammy took me to see Dark Knight last night and we watched Night at the Museum on DVD today. Both great. I hope write reviews sometime in August. See you then!

So, if I post my own quote, does that make me an egotistical jerk, or merely a “self-proclaimed” sage?

It seems that every human has a miraculous, powerful, innate ability to justify the dumb things they do.
-Trint Ladd

I brought home quite a few new conversation enhancements from the Mexico mission trip. I figure I spent about 32 hours over the last week in a van full of teenagers. During this time, I heard many bad jokes, gross stories, and countless repeats of the same less-funny-each-time catch phrases.

From this I came away with a new term which I define below.

collateral audience, n.:
A person or group of people who, despite their best efforts to avoid it, are forced to hear or see something, regardless of whether or not the thing they experienced was intended for their entertainment, consumption, or torture.

Here are some examples to help you know when you are part of a collateral audience.

1) Someone says, “Have you heard the one about…” to which you (and those around you) respond in the affirmative, but one person out of the group says, “no.” Thus you (and all those around you) must endure the story again for the sake of that one person, who, in the end, didn’t think it was funny either. These stories, more often than not, involve farts or Monty Python.

2) An excited youth points and exclaims, “Hey! Look at…” and you instinctively turn your head in the direction which the youth points, burning into your mind an image which you normally would have avoided at all costs, before your brain has time to process the rest of the youth’s statement, which turns out to be something like, “…that bloated dog carcass on the side of the road!”

3) You are in a confined space, say in a restaurant or driving a church van, and roughly 18 inches from the back of your head, two people are having a conversation in which you have no interest, but can not avoid hearing. This can also occur when the conversation in question is happening via cell phone and you’re only hearing half of it. Inevitably, this conversation involves female hygiene products and/or the “hotness” of someone you don’t know, and at least 37 incorrect uses of the word “like” per minute.

I’m back from Mexico and busy as ever. I hope to find the time to compile a short video from the trip and write a long post about my experience. But for now, I’ll have to settle for a white board quip.

There are many kinds of tired. There’s the “I shouldn’t have stayed up that late just to see the end of a crappy movie” tired. Theres the “I spent my weekend stacking 750 bales of hay” tired. And then there’s “mission trip” tired, where you’re spiritually, emotionally, and physically drained to the point where your brain just isn’t able to cope with daily life.

Case in point, from my dear Miss Katie:

Dang! I got conversation all over my pants.

It’s that time again. Crunch time. Between work and church, my summer is already spent. I’ve got two mission trips in July and a major project due at the first of August. So, don’t be surprised at the pitiful lack of posts this month. See you in August.

You may have heard about Newt Gingrich’s “Drill Here. Drill Now. Pay Less.” campaign. But accessing out own natural resources is only one of the three points in Newt’s plan. Watch this to hear all three very simple and sensible steps in his own words. And SIGN THE PETITION!!