This weekend, Tammy and I found a book store going out of business at our local mall. Tammy bought the “last” Harry Potter book, hardback, for $7. I picked up Steve Martin’s autobiography “book on tape” (actually, it’s 4 CDs) for just under $10.

I’ve always had a warm spot in my heart for Steve Martin probably because he was my brother’s favorite comedian back in the late 70’s, when I was just a little guy. I snuck out of bed once and watched Steve on Saturday Night Live with my brother.

I’ve had this Steve Martin quote in my quip database for ages. Now, I’m inspired to post it. It’s from his comedy album that I bought about ten years ago.

Some people have a way with words… others not have way.

I haven’t really taken the time to talk about my theatrical pursuits lately. Time for some catching up.

In early December, I played Joseph, Mary’s betrothed husband, in Stage Right Theatre’s* presentation of “Christmas Heirlooms”. For me it was a tough role to play. Not only am I physically incapable of growing a beard, it was the first time I had role with so much emotional depth. In Heirlooms, Joseph hears of Mary’s pregnancy from a friend and is forced to confront her about it. He runs the gamut from rage, to heartbreak, to shame, and finally reconciliation. I also had to sing, but only a little.

On February 8th and 9th, I’ll be part of an ensemble cast in Stage Right’s dessert theater show, “You Know the Old Slaying.” It’s an “interactive” murder mystery in which the cast and audience work together to figure out who done it.

As an actor, this requires me to stay in character and improv throughout the show. In order to separate our own personas from the roles we are playing (since 90% of the audience will know us outside of the theater) most of the cast will learn new accents for their parts. I’ve always been pretty good at doing foreign accents, but I had to pick one that no one has heard from me before. That is to say, I had to learn a new one. I went with a North Plains, Minnesota/Wisconsin accent (think “Fargo”) and I think I’ve pulled it off.

This show is going to be amazing and the best part is that the audience, for the most part, gets to decide how it ends. If you’re going to be in the area, I strongly recommend attending. We’ll get started at 7:30 PM both nights. Tickets are $7.50 each and desserts are served during the intermission. I can hold tickets for you if you let me know. You can also use my PayPal link at the bottom of the sidebar to pay in advance.

See ya there!

*I continually rib Stage Right’s founder Michael Winters about misspelling “theater.” He insists that the correct spelling, if you are serious about it, is “theatre.” Then I follow with something like, “So if you want to be hoity-toity, you spell it wrong on purpose?”

It has only recently occurred to me that I never blogged about our apartment flood that happened back in March of 2007. Well, our apartment flooded. So there. Now I’ve blogged it.

We had always had low water pressure and complaints were answered with, “We can only give you what the city gives us.” Then, one day I turned on the water in the shower and it almost knocked me over. Seems someone had figured out the problem. About a week later, the increased pressure blew the fittings off the back of our dishwasher when no one was home and the adventure began.

We lost a fair amount of “stuff” when the water rained down from our second story apartment into our garage and storage room. But having just returned from our mission to New Orleans, we were mentally and emotionally prepared for that.

After almost a year we were still dealing with some of the issues created during the flood. By using our lease renewal as leverage, I convinced the management to install new carpet and baseboards. We tried to plan the work to have minimal impact on our lives. Tammy’s business trip to Wisconsin dovetailed nicely into this plan. Also, a friend of ours was looking for some cheap, first-apartment furniture and after about nine years we were ready to replace our living room set. Perfect! All these things coordinated pretty well and the last couple of weeks have gone swimmingly.

We moved all of our furniture into our garage. Then, Tammy headed out. The new carpet was installed on Monday, the new baseboards on Wednesday, and the new furniture arrived Saturday. In the mean time I vacuumed the new carpet over and over, trying to get all the fuzz out before we had to move back in. It literally overpowered our vacuum, require a couple of “trail repairs”. I collected the fuzz in a separate trash bag and it now has the size, shape and weight of a small dog. I am not making that up!

We are about 95% moved back in. Tammy and I have both decided to lower our “stuff factor”. It’s truly amazing how much stuff you can accumulate over time. Tammy culled her clothes once before the carpet arrived and then once more while moving back into her closet. She produced four (Yes, four!) 30 gallon trash bags full of clothes that either don’t fit her physique or don’t fit her fashion. I am so not making this up. There must be 200 pounds of clothes in our garage waiting for a ride to Goodwill.

In that same spirit, the couch and love seat that we planned to give away have now been joined by a badly weathered computer desk, a recliner, and a heavily abused coffee table. We’ve cleaned out all our “junk” drawers, our kitchen, our pantry… the list goes on. The large boxes in which our new pub table and chairs arrived are now overflowing with cast offs.

Culling the cruft from your house can be a liberating experience. We actually have room now! Our tiny kitchen no longer has drawers that won’t quite close. Our walk-in closets can actually be walked in. And for the first time in months, my desktop computer has a desk top surrounding it, rather than piles of things I would never “get back to” no matter how much I wished I could.

It’s like I can breath again. Now, if only we could keep it this way. Wish us luck. Or better yet, pray!

P.S. Is anyone in the market for a wedding gown? Seriously.

Since it’s “that time of year” and I’ve got my own health, diet and exercise on my mind, this post from “You Had Me At Idiot” really made me laugh.

Rated PG for some mild “poo poo” language. You have been warned.

When Trolls Sweat

And if you must know, I’m down to 231.8 as of this morning, down 14.2 pounds from when I first signed up for WeightWatchers.

I’d like to point you guys to a new blog. One of your kids has got her self a real-live grown-up blog over on Blogger. Not a MySpace. Not a FaceBook. An honest to goodness blog.

Katie is a great kid and it seems like every day I’m marveling at how much she has matured. I was especially impress with her post on this year’s resolutions.

I’m proud of you, kiddo!

This week, Tammy finds herself in a foreign land: Wisconsin. It’s kind of a long story.

Her company is doing some rearranging. They’re shifting some business from a warehouse up there to the one where Tammy works here in Dallas. So they sent her to learn how to speak Wisconsinese (I think it’s a dialect related to Canadese). It will be her job to train the folks back here how to do business in this new tongue.

She was supposed to fly out yesterday. We got up a little earlier than usual, had our weekly fellowship at Waffle House, and I took her to the airport. Don’t fret. I was still able to get to church on time.

Then she sent me a text message during church. (See, I was a good boy and set my phone to vibrate so the sermon was not interrupted by an annoying ringer. Instead it was interrupted by me spasming in my pew while my phone vibrated in my pocket in a way that made me feel un-Christian.)

It seems that the Wisconsinese weather was bad (unlike the beautiful, sunny day we had here, high in the upper 70’s) and her flight was delayed, then delayed so more, and finally canceled. (Yes, I was “filled with the Spirit” in my pants several times during the sermon.) I had to stay after church and clean erasers due to my vibrating pants, so a friend of ours got Tammy back home.

Tammy’s flight was rescheduled for 7 AM this morning and because Tammy is a model citizen she wanted to get to the airport an hour or so early. (I’ve learned that when Tammy says, “an hour or so,” it translates to what I call, “about two hours.”) So if you do the math, that means I got up at that hour which I still refuse to believe exists (<whispers>five-ay-em</whispers>) and drove her to the airport again.

This time the flight went smoothly and, as I type this, she is learning all about the Wiscon people. Maybe she’ll be able to tell me why they wear cheese on their heads. I’ve always wondered. Maybe it’s good for your hair. *shrug*

The chocolate drive is drawing to a close. My friend, Tech Sergent Adam Page will be coming home from Iraq later this month, but he has assured me that our efforts will continue to benefit the wounded troops who come through the 332nd CASF hospital through his commanding officer and his replacement.

So far, we’ve shipped over 120 pounds of chocolate candy to Iraq. Not a single piece has been damaged or melted in shipping. But in a matter of weeks, the temperatures will be warm enough to make shipping impossible. My goal is to get 200 pounds shipped before that happens.

Alt-N, my awesome employer, has graciously offered to pay for all the shipping. (It comes out to about $1 a pound.) So any cash donations have been and will continue to be turned into sugary goodness. I’ve purchased about $150 worth so far. If you’d like to help out, you can donate via PayPal by clicking the link at the bottom of the sidebar.

Adam has sent some pictures! (Adam’s the guy with the birthmark.)

Bonus material: Adam celebrated his birthday in Iraq, and I scraped some pictures from his Flickr site. His crew had a lot of fun with it. I hope he doesn’t get mad at me for posting these. It took six, well trained airmen to tie him down, so I wouldn’t stand a chance!

So here we are marking the arbitrary point in Earth’s orbit once again. Time to contemplate life looking behind and ahead.

While 2006 only ranked as “ok”, I’d have to say 2007 was a good year for me. I’ve made advances in almost every aspect of my life. Here are some of the highlights and lowlights of my year.

• Took on more of a leading role at church…
  • Got certified to drive the short bus. Seriously.
  • Was a team leader during the New Orleans mission trip.
  • Took a leading role with the youth while we searched for new staff.
• Survived a flooded apartment. (New carpet and furniture arrive in January 2008.)
• Took a great vacation to Colorado and climbed Pikes Peak… almost.
• Lost a great co-working in Dave, but took over as team lead and moved to the corner office.
• Started WeightWatchers and lost about 15 pounds so far (which surpasses my goal set last January).
• Coordinated a couple of really great volunteer/relief efforts, including Adam Page’s chocolate drive.
• I would say (and I hope she would agree) that Tammy and I have strengthened our marriage this year.

Now it’s time for me to set some goals for 2008. I met two of the seven goals I set in December of 2006. That’s good for me. I tend to set my goals pretty high. That way, even if I don’t achieve them, I’ve pushed myself in the effort. Here’s a few of my 2008 goals:

• Pass at least three Microsoft certification tests.
• Memorize 52 new Bible verses.
• Ride the entire North Shore mountain bike trail in a single day.
• Read four non-fiction and two fiction books.
• 200 pounds.

So here’s to 2008. May it be a good year for us all.

2007 sure was great,
But now it’s time for 2008.
I’m sure ’08 will be just fine,
But not as good as 2009!

If you’ve ever met me, you probably know that I’m a germaphobe. (The actual term is mysophobe, but nobody knows what that means.) Just today, I was laughed at repeatedly when I had to visit a busy, downtown hospital with some co-workers. My hands never left my pockets and I kept my mouth closed as much as possible.

But once in a while a story comes along that makes it all worth it. I love when I get the chance to say, “Look who’s laughing now!!”

A quick google of this story reveals that it’s been around the new for a while, but I just came across it today. Watch the video and bask in the horror.

Clicky clicky.

Please take a moment to visit Tammy’s blog and lend her your support as her grandma passed away today.

Thanks.