Bummed Out at the End of an Awesome Day!

This is Glyn. Glyn is sad. You can tell because, when he's sad, he talks about himself in the third person (a kind of detachment thing I suppose). Glyn is bummed out because this evening he tried to do something that he hasn't done in a number of years - and he was unable to do it. He was never brilliant at the thing that he tried tonight when he did used to do it many years ago but he always assumed that when you knew how to do it, you'd always know and was therefore expecting to be able to do it - but he couldn't. It wasn't even that he was just rusty. He actually just could not do it. Whatever part of his brain had enabled him to do this thing in the past (for confidentiality reasons, Glyn is unable to disclose what that thing actually was) has gone completely now. Vanished. Removed completely from existence. Glyn might has well never have known how to do this thing. It was an extra sad time for Glyn because all of his friends, who had also tried the thing (and many of them had not done the thing for a number of years either) were really pleased at how well they all managed to do the thing. But it's a shame that Glyn feels this way at all because the rest of the day had been absolutely brilliant. In fact, when Glyn focusses on the day rather than the thing, I am suddenly much happier (see? back into first person). I've had an awesome day. A day involving picnics and frisbees and rounders and my first ever flip flops (thank you Chell) and friends and barbeques and home made burgers (thank you Roland) and getting lost and dancing and music and sitting out under the stars and Risk. So I guess it's not really appropriate for me to gripe about "the thing" when I've had such a great day. Maybe the above picture shouldn't be so morose then. It should have more colour. More life. More pizzazz. Something like this:

Procrastination Hall of Fame!

After many a thought about procrastination since I blogged about it last week, I have decided to set up a blog dedicated to the art of procrastination.

Actually, that's not entirely true. It was after reading John Mitch's blog in which he wrote his own eurovision song and I said it should be in the Procrastination Hall of Fame and then I thought, "hey, that's not a bad idea" and it was then that I decided to set up a blog dedicated to the art of procrastination (don't worry John, the song'll be in there).

So ladies and gentlemen, I present to you: The Procrastination Hall of Fame!

Needless to say that I really need to have something finished by tomorrow morning and will likely be up most of the night getting it done but there's a small part of me (albeit a very small part) that thinks it was worth it.

P.S. I also doubt it will last more than two posts (three tops).

Gotcha!

For all those who continue to be concerned for the whereabouts of my laptop, I think I may have found it:

I'm sure it's one of those anyway.

P.S. I have no idea what Shut Down Day's about (if pushed I'd guess it had something to do with shutting down something but what and why? These are questions that I cannot answer) but it seems we've missed it anyway.

How Rude?

This morning, during my driving lesson, a song came on the radio which got my instructor quite riled up. It's that one by Sandy Rivera (see above photo) about licking ice cream and lollipops and other such sexually explicit confectionary. It made him angry because his 5 year old daughter, who doesn't understand the connotations of what she's singing, often dances round the house belting out hearty renditions of the tune. It made me think of another couple of examples when innappropriate lyrics have been warbled by innocent voices.

I remember when I was a kid singing along (quite passionately) to "Girl I Want to Make You Sweat" by UB40. I'm not sure if I'd have been able to offer any suggestions, at the tender age of 10, as to what was making the poor girl cry but I certainly didn't clock the strong references to, what now seems to me, pretty forceful sex, bordering on rape. I had no idea. Even my grandparents would be subject to my sung tales of how I was going to push it, push it some more.

Another story that came to me was when I was in Manchester with Rhema Theatre Company and I stayed with a family one week while we were on mission. One evening the family invited me to join with them in a game of Playstation Karaoke. We got into pairs to play the duet game and I was teamed up with the family's 8 year old son. He chose for us to sing Maroon 5's This Love and I, not being wholly familiar with the song at the time (but knowing it was a good tune) was quite happy with this. The song started and I couldn't believe it. This 8 year old was happily and unwittingly singing about all the things that he does to keep his girlfriend satisfied and I, unsurprisingly, decided to opt out (I was unable to sing the rude lines because they were rude but was then unable to sing the rest for laughing). The father apologised and explained that his son, of course, had no idea what he was singing.

I guess this happens all the time in our current pop culture. I'm just not sure how to react to a child singing innuendos. Do you tell them not to sing it and then have to explain why? Or do you just let it slide because, as far as they're concerned, what's wrong with licking a lollipop?

I Sleep in Crust!!

I want the world to know that I have been living in Matt and Christina's spare room since December and I have not once changed my bed sheets. I am not proud of this but it's part of who I am and PEOPLE WILL NOT CHANGE ME!!!!

So to Matt White and Matt Leeder who are trying to blackmail me with this piece of information, it's not going to work. You can change your own darn sheets.

I'm happy for mine to look like this.

Procrastination:

(pro-crass-tin-ay-shun)
noun
1. the act of procrastinating; putting off or delaying or defering an action to a later time

noun
2. slowness as a consequence of not getting around to it

(pro-crass-tin-ate)
verb (used without object)
3. to defer action; delay: to procrastinate until an opportunity is lost.

verb (used with object)
4. to put off till another day or time; defer; delay.

verb (intr.)
5. to put off doing something, especially out of habitual carelessness or laziness.

verb (tr.)
6. to postpone or delay needlessly.

10 Interesting Facts About Procrastination

1) Procrastination derives from the latin procrastinare meaning "defer till the morning" - from pro meaning "forward" and crastinus meaning "belonging to tomorrow" (from cras meaning "tomorrow").

2) The word procrastinate was orignially coined in 1548 by Edward Hall in The Union of the Two Noble and Illustre Famelies of Lancestre and Yorke and was recorded as an English word for the first time in 1588.

3) "Procrastination" was dictionary.com's Word of the Day on August 17th 2002.

4) Here are some pictures of people procrastinating:

5) The physiological roots for procrastination are thought to come from the area of the brain called the prefrontal cortex which "acts as a filter by decreasing distracting stimuli from other brain regions. Damage or low activation in this area can reduce an individual's ability to filter out distracting stimuli, ultimately resulting in poorer organisation, a loss of attention and increased procrastination" (Wikipedia).

6) Paul Graham argues that not all procrastination is bad:

"There are three variants of procrastination, depending on what you do instead of working on something: you could work on (a) nothing, (b) something less important, or (c) something more important. That last type, I'd argue, is good procrastination."

7) Procrastination is thought to have more to do with anxiety than laziness.

8) Here is a good example of where procrastination can lead:

9) The internet is both the best friend and the worst enemy of the procrastinator.

10) 20% of the population identify themselves as chronic procrastinators.

Hmm. Interesting. I should probably get on with my report.

The Greatest Milkshake in the World!

Sunday night was one of the best youth fellowship evenings I've known for a while. Thanks to a moment of inspired genius from Christina White, we spent it making milkshakes. If you've ever been to Shakeaway then it was that kinda thing with the guys choosing what flavours they wanted from Twixes and Oreo Cookies and Skittles and fruit and then mixing it with milk and icecream to create awesome milkshake flavours (if, for whatever reason, you've never been to a Shakeaway, then get on it straight away - ignorance is no longer an excuse).

I was in charge of milkshake production (see above photo) and for those of you who want to make your own, I found this was the best way to do it:

For a pint of milkshake, fill a pint glass two thirds full with milk and put into liquidiser (blenders also work but not as well as the liquidiser). Then add three scoops of icecream (for thicker/creamier milkshakes then you can add more but this is the best amount to use for a good consistency if you're making milkshakes for a whole youth group and don't want to run out of icecream). Then add whatever you want to flavour your milkshake with (can be anything - sweets, chocolate and fruit are the most popular options but Shakeaway do a cucumber flavour milkshake and there's even a place in London that sells marmite flavoured shakes). Blend for about a minute and then pour. Magic.

It was all very nice and pleasant but then, I came up with the ultimate in milkshake flavouringness:

Barbeque Chicken Pizza Flavoured Milkshake.

It was awesome. We had a whole pint and between about 6 or 7 of us brave enough to give it a go, we managed to consume about a tenth of that. The tasting consisted of a brief sip, tasting the concoction, realising what we'd just done, scrunching our faces in disgust (those watching were way ahead of us on that one), stomping, flapping our arms, covering our mouths, making muffled "Hmmm! HMMMM!" noises, finally swallowing and then taking great pride in what we'd achieved.

Needless to say, it was a guy thing.

The Big List!

There seems to be a big fuss over bloglist positions these days. Everyone seems to have a different method. Andy Hill takes the alphabetical approach while Kirsty takes the week off to calculate blogging consistency ratios. Everyone else, it would seem, measure the worth of their own blog by how high up they appear on other people's blogrolls. As such, I may have caused some offence. I should clarify that I have no such system. People appear on my list simply by the order they were put on the list. The only exceptions are Kirsty and Becky (Wainthropp) as they were added as replacements for people who simply weren't blogging. So please don't read anything into it. It really doesn't mean anything.

They Call Me Jesus...

The past couple of weeks I have been going into one of the local schools in Chelmsford to lead some lessons on Easter. I was looking forward to these lessons. I had done some year 7 lessons on Christmas in this same school and I really enjoyed it. The kids were a lot of fun and asked some massive questions. I had no reason to suspect this would be any different.

I had 14 lessons booked. I had seven year 8 classes who I had never met and then the familiar year 7 groups made up the other half. Although any young class are usually excited to have a guest teacher in (the word soon spread that the bearded Christian guy throws out chocolate eggs at the end), I was especially pleased to be greeted by my year 7 friends with exclamations of "oh cool, it's him again" and "yesss, this lesson is going to be fun" (although, having said that, one conversation did go something more like this: Girl #1: "Oh look it's that man again" Girl#2: "What do you mean man?!" Girl #1: "Alright, it's that boy").

But then one of the kids said something weird:

"Cool. It's that guy who did the Christmas lessons. It's Jesus."

The name caught on.

By the end of the two weeks, I was unable to walk through the playground without being bombarded by shouts of "hey Jesus" and "look - it's Jesus" and the popular "got any eggs Jesus?".

My first reaction was to think about the extent to which I'd failed. I'm not supposed to be Jesus. Why aren't they taking Jesus more seriously? Why is Jesus just a funny nickname to these kids?

But then something occurred to me. Maybe I am supposed to be Jesus. Not in a "Carry On Calling Me Jesus and Come Follow Me" type Waco kind of way. But in a "I Might Be the Only Experience of Jesus Some of These Kids Get" kind of way.

Now I should make two things clear at this point:

Number 1: My nickname of Jesus probably had far more to do with the beard and long hair than my inspirational grace and compassion for mankind.

(Note: The picture above is of me and was drawn by one of the year 8 students. Cute when they're five. Not so much so when they're 13 and should be listening. Still, I appreciated the gesture. And if that's how I look I can kind of understand the Jesus thing)

Number 2: I was not encouraging (nor will I ever encourage) anyone to call me Jesus.

But it did make me think. What if I am the only representative of Jesus that some of these young people will ever encounter? That's a big responsibility. Essentially, I do have to be Jesus to them. I have to act as Jesus would have acted. I have to show them the character and grace and love that Jesus would have shown. I have to teach as Jesus would have taught (although I think I can do better - Jesus never had PowerPoint).

I have to be Jesus (or as close as I can get). My Jesus impersonation has always left much to be desired but I owe it to everyone I work with and for to try and be more Christlike.

Maybe there's nothing I can do about the nickname. But I can certainly try to live up to it.

Sad Day!

So today, I had to tell Helen (DYO for South Western Division of the Salvation Army) that I was unable to go to SWSCA (South Western School of Christian Arts) this year. I'm absolutely gutted because I loved it last year and have been looking forward to it since September.

So to all my SWSCA friends who read this blog, I'm truly sorry. I will miss you all and will be thinking of you.

Success!

I am currently lying in bed having acheived something that I haven't quite managed for some time...

I've finished a book.

Now this may not seem as intensely remarkable to many of you as it feels for me. I am sure that the vast majority of those reading this will be well read and bookishly advanced. Why, the very fact that you frequent this blog would suggest that your literary palette draws you to the finer and more exceptional examples of writing. And as such you are no doubt wandering why finishing a book is such a big deal. So let me explain.

I used to read a lot. I used to love reading. In fact I think it was my love for reading that encouraged me to read so much. But for the past few months (in fact probably since starting my current job) I've had a real issue with reading. I just haven't seemed able to really get stuck into a book and even if I have, I get distracted by another literary masterpiece before I get to finish the previous one. I just cannot seem to finish books anymore. It is most annoying. Here is a list of books I haven't finished recently:

Beyond Belief to Conviction (Josh McDowell), I.O.U. (Noreena Hertz), The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More (Roald Dahl), The God Delusion (Richard Dawkins), The Highway Code, Impro for Storytellers (Keith Johnstone), Desiring God (John Piper), The Struggle (Steve Gerali), Cafe Theology (Michael Lloyd), Show Them No Mercy (Stanley Gundry), The Other Side of the Good News (Larry Dixon), Darwin on Trial (Philip E. Johnson), Games for Actors and Non-Actors (Augusto Boal), Down Under (Bill Bryson) and Lift the Label (Westlake & Stansfield).

Needless to say, all this failure in book reading has been quite frustrating. Which is why I am so elated to be lying in bed next to a completely read copy of John Irving's The Fourth Hand. It's a good book. Not quite as good as some of his other works (A Prayer for Owen Meany is my favourite) but a good read nonetheless. I would recommend it.

Minisalvos!

You may or may not have heard of Minipops. You may have seen them but not known what they were called. On the other hand, you may not have.

Minipops are awesome. They basically consist of famous people drawn with but a few pixels (usually around about 30 high).

So for example, here is a Minipop of 50 Cent:

Here is a Minipop of the A-Team:

And here is a Minipop of the cast of Fawlty Towers:

Feeling inspired by such artistic genius, I decided to have a crack at my own. So ladies and gentlemen, I present to you, my very own Minipops of the models in the SP&S catalogue (or Minisalvos as I like to call them):

What do you think?

P.S. SP&S, for those who don't know, stands for Salvationist Publishing & Supplies and basically acts as the Salvation Army's shopping centre for all things good.

5 Things I'm Incredibly Grateful For:

Anyone who is particularly close to me (and especially my family) will know how difficult I find it to be genuine about anything and how I usually avoid saying what something or someone means to me. I don't know why but I just tend to run away from any kind of real emotion. But there are certain things in my life at the moment for which I am monumetally thankful for. And while I don't agree with communicating anything via the internet that you couldn't express in person (I also find texting particularly annoying), that is exactly what I'm going to do here. So please forgive my complete lack of integrity as I list 5 things that I am incredibly grateful for:

1) My Family. They never hear this but I thank God that I have been blessed with an awesome family: My Dad for his leadership, wisdom and support; my Mum for her grace and compassion; my little sister, Lisa for her spiritual maturity; and Daniel (my younger yet bigger brother) for his talent and his friendship.

2) The Whites. Also known as my family #2, Matt and Christina have allowed me into their home and given up their spare room (something that Christina is very excited about getting back once I leave) so that I have somewhere to call my own. I absolutely love living here and the past couple of months have been a lot of fun.

3) Friends. The past few months I have come to realise that I have some pretty awesome friends. Whether it's partying at old-man Andy's 30th birthday meal or hanging out round a bonfire with friends at Matt and Michelle's I have truly been blessed. I would name them all one by one but this post is already starting to sound like an album sleeve so I'll leave it at that.

4) Chelmsford Salvation Army. It's weird going to a Corps in which my parents aren't the leaders but I have been made to feel really welcome and catered for at Chelmsford SA. I must confess to being pretty wary at first but after the first couple of dinner invitations I came to realise that there's a great sense of community there and I'm becoming more and more proud to call it my church.

5) My Job. Although pretty scary sometimes and always challenging, I love my job. I love being able to meet young people and hang out with Christian teenagers as they tell me about their passions for their respective schools. It's been really inspiring and stretching and...uh...yeah - I love it.

So there you go. 5 things I'm incredibly grateful for.

The End.

Snow Pun Intended.

It's snowing really heavily. We're snowed in. We've got a large garden. But Matt won't come out and make a snowman with me. Boo Matt boo!!

Hair Today, Long Tomorrow!

Look at my hair:

It has gotten big. And it's untidy. And it's messy. And that's very similar in meaning to the word untidy so probably didn't need to be said. I would like to do something with it (and as I listen carefully I can hear the distant sound of my mother whooping joyfully). The trouble is I don't know what to do with it. This is how my hair cycle currently works:

1) Get hair cropped short.

2) Grow hair long.

3) Don't know what to do with hair other than...

4) Get hair cropped short.

5) Grow hair long.

6) Don't know what to do with hair other than...

7) Get hair cropped short.

8) Grow hair long.

9) Am chastised by members of my corps for not having short and well kept hair in keeping with the traditions of the Salvation Army.

10) Shave hair off completely by way of protest.

11) Realise that doing exactly what they want you to do is a crap form of protest.

12) Grow hair long.

13) Don't know what to do with hair other than...

And so on and so forth (lather, rinse, repeat).

The thing is, I quite like it long. I just don't like it messy. And I certainly don't want to crop it.

So what do I do? I don't even know what my options are.

The "Make Matt Leeder Feel Loved" Campaign

If you're anything like me (and more people should be) you will have missed regular postings from Matt Leeder's blog as of late. And if you're like me (and if not, why not?) you will have wandered where he's beeen and why it is he's had so little to say. Well his latest post has revealed that Mr Leeder is feeling somewhat disillusioned by the fact that no one seems interested in his blog (which includes - among tons of other stuff - exciting and informative reviews about obscure musical artists). I think this is a shame and does not reflect the truth that people around the world (that may be generous but I'm gonna stick with it) love him and his blog.

So I am starting a campaign to get as many people to view and comment on Matt Leeder's blog as possible. Please consider this. Two comments a month (or whatever you can spare) is all that is needed to make Matt feel appreciated.

So go on - make a rockstar feel loved.

Ben Folds

So last night I went to see Ben Folds at Hammersmith Apollo. Now I'm ashamed to say it but it was my first ever concert. But what a way to start. It was flippin' awesome. The above photo shows two things:

1) How close we were to Ben Folds.

2) How rubbish my camera phone is.

I went with Matt White (my ticket was his and Christina's Christmas present to me), Simon White and Beth (Off-White) Hampbell. It was great. Highlights included:

1) Swapping life stories with Beth as we tried to keep the conversation going on the train (and also using the time to practice the horn section in Army - something that proved beneficial).

2) Singing the horn section in Army.

3) Listening to Simon White shouting at everyone.

4) Watching Matt try to intimidate someone twice his size with his "broad" irish accent (I should point out that this guy just came from the back and stood right in front of us - I should also point out that the Irish thing seemed to work).

5) Performing the YMCA amongst a crowd of Ben Folds fans so that Mike and AJ McCredie (who were also there but had seats) could try and spot me from the balcony AND THEN DISCOVERING THAT THEY WEREN'T EVEN LOOKING!!

So there we go. Ben Folds: Awesome

Awesome Pool Trick Shots!

24 Weekend

This is going to be awesome!

Shifting the Focus.

Last Sunday I felt really challenged. I'm not sure if it was the sermon on letting God move us into the future whilst protecting us from the past or if it was the visit of Richard and Heidie Bradbury talking about the Cikankata hospital in Zambia or if it was just wind or if it was a wild and crazy culmination of all 3 but I felt, coming into this new year, that I need to start thinking differently.

I am incredibly talented when it comes to thinking about myself. I don't want you to think that I'm just blowing my own trumpet here. It's true. I'm brilliant at it. Grade A. I could think about myself and my needs and my worries for days on end if I had to. And most of the time I don't even have to. I do it just because I can. I'm that good.

The problem is that when one becomes so unrestrainably competent at thinking of oneself, one tends to neglect the growing issue of others.

Others are not always easy to think about. For a start, others are not me. Others are... well, other. Others are not of me. Others are outside of me. Most others are not in the room. They are not in the building, town or country. Most others live in countries I have never been to and speak in languages I will never understand. I have not met, seen or had contact with the vast majority of others. And the others I have had contact with...well, they are still other...aren't they?

And then there's me. I spend a lot of time with me. Me tends to go with me wherever I go. I don't have to think very hard to think of me because there me is. I have a constant reminder of me - me.

And I have always hated that. I have been well aware that all my faults and all my fears and all my insecurities stem from my own self-centredness. I have been desperate to change - to shift the focus - to put others before myself. But thinking of myself is just...so easy.

I tend to gripe that I am not able to do enough for society. I have been with the Salvation Army all my life and have never worked in a soup kitchen or had a conversation with a man living on the streets or prayed with a prostitute. I've never done any of the things that I'm most proud of the Salvation Army for. And I moan that it's because I don't have the opportunity or that the Salvation Army isn't doing enough at Corps level or that no one is telling me how to help others.

The truth is, I don't do any of those things because I don't care enough.

Due to the extreme seriousness of this post, the blog's administrator would like to break it up with this quirky little cartoon:

Funny eh?

And on Sunday, I realised that it was time things changed. I need to spend more time actively and deliberately thinking of others by focussing on God.

I decided to start a savings account last week when the new iPhone was announced so that, come October (when the phone is released in Europe), I'll have enough money to buy it. And in the mean time, I'm sitting in Church on Sunday, wishing that I had the money/opportunity/time to go to Africa and do mission work. I'M SAVING UP £500 FOR AN I-PHONE!! WHO NEEDS AN I-PHONE!?!! Despite it's incredible multi-touchscreen capabilities, visual voicemail and state-of-the-art internet access (ah man, who am I kidding - everyone needs an iPhone - but it can wait).

So instead, I'm going to set up my savings account, save for a couple of years and then see what's available. And in the mean time, I'm going to do more. And I'm going to do that by putting other people first once in a while (who knows? It might turn into a habit).

So that's my new years resolution. To think less about me and more about others.

Writing a really long blog about myself probably wasn't the best of starts.