Another Top Five

Here's my Top Five Photos of 2008:

#1 A picture I took in Eagle Creek Park this past fall by Lilly Lake.
#2 A picture taken at Shades State Park
#3 Another picture I took at Eagle Creek on a separate occasion. I went with Christy to the Discovery Center and found this cool little dock at sunset.
#4 The visible spectrum of light being refracted through my Dr. Reisling wine.
#5 This was taken when I spent the weekend with my friend Alex; this is a cornfield in Noblesville.

A Few Top Fives

My friend Steve is encouraging people to post their favorite "Top Fives," so here are two related ones.

First, a video of my Top Five Favorite Personal Skate Clips (in no particular order):



#1 frontside anchor grind nollie shuv
#2 sewer ride to fakie in a ditch near the Round Rock Skate Park
#3 frontside 50-50 nollie backside bigspin
#4 board stall nollie shuv on an elastic tree branch
#5 a nollie backside bigger spin

Next are my Top Five Favorite Personal Skate Photos (also in no particular order):

Pop Shuv-It

Ollie

Sewer to Fakie

Noseslide to Fakie

Wallride

Almost Graduate

I finished my first of four finals this morning. It feels good to be done with collegiate courses! I have one on thursday night, and then the last two on saturday, and then I am finally done and get my degree in Chemistry.

After my final this morning, I did a little bit of creative work for a new set of songs I'm going to be getting around. The project is called "Out of Order." Here's a few peeks:

An Abrupt Consciousness

I woke up this morning with quite a piercing first thought: I'm only praising God because I want something from Him.

Woah. That's not usually how I start most days, but I'm really thankful for such a blunt awareness as that. I've really been praying for a job, but lately I've been so focused on the job part that I've been trying to "use" God. I need to change that because that's a really crooked way to treat Jesus. He is worthy of praise no matter what I go through, no matter what I have, no matter what I lose. Always. And today has been different, and I'm really glad that God showed me that so that I could change it.

I went skating today, and landed a new trick... well, I landed a fakie heelflip--a familiar trick--over the largest flat gap I've ever tried it over (around three feet). It doesn't sound like much, but I cleared it completely and rolled away smooth. It was definitely a highlight of today. Here's a sequence of the very talented Kellen James doing a fakie heel down a more sizable gap:

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

Yesterday I went with a couple of friends to Manchester College in North Manchester, IN to visit a friend of one of my friend's friends. We visited and talked with her, then we spent some time praying for her and the campus. We procured a guitar and some drums and went to Worshiptown in the chapel. Afterwards we went to Warsaw and got some cheap and delicious chinese food (they gave us free sweet rolls). We went across the street to Central Park and ate watching the Christmas lights.

Here are a few shots from the park:




You may notice that the title of this blog is a line from a famous Christmas song. I'd like to talk about that now. Christmas songs.

I don't understand why people don't sing Christmas songs all year round. I am thankful every day that Jesus became a man to walk the earth that He created. Once when I lead worship last year I tried to do a Christmas song and it was discouraged because it wasn't Christmas time (the song was "O Come, O Come Emmanuel"). I'm not talking about songs like "I'm Dreaming Of A White Christmas" or "Jingle Bells." I'm talking about real Christmas songs. I find that a good portion of songs like "Silent Night" and "We Three Kings" do have moments of praise, but are primarily stories about stars and journeys. I'm talking about songs that glorify Jesus Christ, born and risen.

I think the main reason that I don't enjoy that this happens is because I see Christians getting swept under the "Christmas rug," or sorts. We can redeem Christmas (trust me, there is a LOT of pagan ritualism in almost every corner of the Christmas secular tradition), but it's going to take us acting differently and believing differently, and showing that we are not alright with what is happening to the celebration of the birth of our Lord.

God is jealous for our attention at all times, not just after Thanksgiving and before New Years.

Dallas Clayton: Skateboard Poem

I came across this "poem" about skateboarders. It's quite factual (besides the cheap part).
___________________________________________________________

ENDLESS

You should learn to skateboard.
It is cheap and fun.
It is something you can do when you are alone
or with friends.
Once you learn, you can hang out late at night in parking lots for hours and hours
(and you don’t even have to be high).
Also you can talk to others about skateboarding
and it will make them think you are cool
and they will give you things
like free stickers, or invitations to parties
with lots of guys at them.


If you get good
you can jump over all sorts of things
like cars, and European streets, and statues, and off small buildings.
and people will take pictures of you
which is nice (for later, to show your kids).

If you get really good,
maybe someone will pay you
to take pictures, and make videos of you jumping off all sorts of crap
and they will put you on billboards
and benches where homeless people sleep
and your name will be on thousands of pairs of shoes.
Maybe you will have a video game with you in it
or a TV show where you shoot your friends with weapons.

Or maybe not.

Maybe you will just keep doing it and no one will really care how good you are and you will just use your skateboard to ride down the street
to buy some beer
when your “old lady” takes off with the car.

It’s up to you I guess.
Like anything else.

But you should definitely learn.
It will be worth it
in the long run.

I promise.
___________________________________________________________

For more of Dallas Clayton's work, click here.

This Isn't Your Daddy's Communion

After a very relaxing and quite enjoyable break, I went to my first class this morning and then went to Campus House to do some reading. I brought an Amp energy drink with me, and right as I was opening it I had an idea. A few months ago I was with my friends and we wanted to take communion together, so I ran to the cupboard and got some hamburger buns. Then I opened the fridge and grabbed a Kool-Aid Tropical Punch Jammer (we didn't have anything remotely grape-like).

The bread was still similar, and it didn't phase me that "Jesus' blood" was blue and fruity. It was a neat experience and ever since I've enjoyed repeating it with the sincerest of reverence and the utmost creativity.

Back to this morning, I grabbed a Dark Chocolate Milky Way (the body) and set it down next to my Amp (the blood). I reflected upon how awesome Jesus is: He forgives me in a heartbeat and doesn't lord it over me, He gives me the best when I don't deserve it, and trusts me with the atoms of His creation (amongst other things). I took the Milky Way and a sip of the Amp--it was quite enjoyable, and a nice way to remind myself that communion is meant to remind us of what Jesus did.

I thought to myself that although I doubt Jesus' blood was green, his skin was probably much closer to the color of dark chocolate than white bread.