Animals, Angels, and the rest

We're catching up, slowly but surely. Here's the next batch of completed entries (I'm up to 47 hours of work at this point, btw).

Sunday, June 17, 2007

Father’s Day has come and gone.

I finally decided to buckle down yesterday and buy my dad’s present from the collective children, which included gift certificates for movies and Famous Dave’s, some chocolate-covered cherries, and a new game, The Last Word. I had never played it before, but it seemed to have a decent enough premise, so I bit the bullet. After church and a lunch of steak, corn on the cob, and baked potatoes, my family sat down to attempt this new game. The goal is to be the last person to say a word that starts with the appropriate letter and fits in the appropriate category before the buzzer goes off. It really is that simple too, and we had a good time playing it. Quick rounds too; we were able to fit in three boys vs. girls rounds in probably an hour at most.

Another game of hand and foot ensued at the end of the day, following a trip to Motley for a grad party. It was extremely close, especially going into the last round, but dad pulled out the victory with a big dumpster dive that created multiple clean books. I came in third for the second game in a row, both being behind Abby and within a few hundred points of the champion. Oh well, it was a nice way to cap off Father’s Day for everyone, especially dad!

I started reading Rob Bell’s “Sex God” tonight, and it’s pretty good so far (I’m through the introduction and first two chapters). The subtitle is “Exploring the endless connections between sexuality and spirituality,” and that really says it all. The first few chapters highlight the creation of man and what is significant about the narration in Genesis. Pretty basic stuff so far, nothing too Earth-shattering, but solid nonetheless. I might hold off on Half-Blood Prince for a bit to see how this goes.

Monday, June 18, 2007

So… much… work.

I got up this morning and started work at 7:30. Our job was a wood job, which I usually enjoy doing because it’s kind of like fitting a puzzle together. Even though it is harder on my body than a normal carpet day, the reward is greater both creatively and financially (wood jobs are some of the best money-makers in our field).

This job, by all accounts, should have been better than usual: the wood was 5” wide, rather than the typical 3 ¼” pieces, and the room was pretty wide open with very few tricky cuts. All the makings of a “gravy” day, in the words of my dad.

Not so much.

We had such a hard time getting the pieces to fit together all day. There would be pieces that looked great, we’d nail them in, put the next row on, and it would look like crap all of a sudden with gaps and cracks everywhere. So we’d take off the new row, rip out the old, and replace it with a new piece. This one would go fine, but we’d have wasted ten minutes just getting the stupid piece out. We were supposed to be installing 700 sq ft of wood; by 6 we had installed 600, and were stuck. We could not get the next row to work, no matter what we did. We were afraid we would have to take off several rows and re-do some 50 feet of wood, which would suck. All of this was taking place without the aid of my father, however, as he was working at church today, so we called him and he said to stop where we were and he would come up and try to fix it.

The other guys all went home, but I went back to the job with dad. He was expecting the worst
going into it, but was relieved to discover he could fix the problem by removing just two boards and doing some fancy cutting on the replacement pieces. This went great, and we kept moving to try and finish the kitchen so they could set cabinets even if we weren’t able to get back to this job for a couple of days. By the time we were done it was 9, and I was pretty tired (13 ½ hour days will do that).

I really just want to go to sleep right now.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Animals and Angels.

That is the title of the chapter out of “Sex God” that I read last night, and it was really, really good. The chapter discusses how there are two extremes to how humans can view sex: there is the animal perspective, where it is an inborn desire that is insatiable, a fact of life that we will eventually succumb to, and there is the angel perspective, where sex is a primitive act that is not discussed or acknowledged, and essentially only exists for procreation purposes. The problem with these views, Bell says, is that we, as humans, were not created as simply animals or angels. Animals are bodies without souls; angels are souls without bodies. As humans, we have both bodies and souls, and therefore there must be some sort of middle ground that exists where both the desires of the flesh and the soul are satisfied. In this place, sex is not a given, nor is it unspeakable. A balance must be achieved that both acknowledges and encourages the sexuality that is inborn in all humans, and is able to control this force to avoid its abuse.

I wish there was some quote that I could give you from it, but I would really need to post the whole chapter, as the progression in thought and logic is really key to understanding the important points made later in the text. I’m excited to keep going in this book and see where this thought goes.

I also had one of the most vivid dreams I’ve had in awhile last night. I dreamt I was at some sort of high school dance, one where they parade all the couples around in front of the parents, all that jazz. I didn’t recognize my date, but I remember knowing that she was one of the most popular girls in school, and she seemed to be having a great time. At some point I realized she was blind, but this didn’t really change too much about what happened except she bumped into different objects around the room when I would forget to guide her (she didn’t seem to mind this, and laughed about it every time she ran into something). So it was a weird kind of date, and yet I remember having such a great time with her, I actually felt great all day today as a result. Even though I have no idea who this person was, not to mention it didn’t actually happen, I still found myself returning to that feeling from my dream throughout the day. Thinking about that in hindsight, I guess I’m weird. Any suggestions on the meaning of this dream are welcome and appreciated.

During the middle of the cursed wood job yesterday, I realized my phone was beginning its slow march toward death. I had thought the battery was dying faster up here because of the terrible reception at the cabin, but it turns out that’s not the only reason. Even with some semblance of service, my battery gave out early on yesterday, so I had several messages by the end of the day, one from Big Loud Bucks, who wanted to schedule an interview for the today. I was able to get a hold of them on Dean’s phone, and scheduled a phone interview for 11:30.

Well, in order to conserve my precious battery life, I worked the morning without turning my phone on, and called promptly at 11:30, only to have my phone begin beeping at me that the battery was running out a mere 10 minutes into the conversation. This lasted for 20 more minutes before it died completely, and I had to run in and grab DJ’s phone to finish up the interview. It went very well, and I think I have a great shot at being offered the position. I have no idea what kind of salary they’re looking at, but I do know they’re not looking to hire until late July at the earliest, so I may end up staying up here for a few extra weeks if this all works out, allowing me to make an extra grand or so before heading back and having two weeks to get back into the swing of things on that end of the world. I guess we’ll wait and see.

In the meantime, I need a new phone.

And today was another 11 ½ hour day, so I need some rest.

11:18, hopeful, stagnantly, cheeseburgers