Well, here I am in the mountains of New Mexico. Me and 6 other guys are up here being men. So far we have climbed, fished and went into an old mine shaft. It is a good time. But there is always this thing in the back of my mind. On top of missing Holly alot I can't help but think I will be married in exactly 2 weeks. This will be the biggest event of my life. I am excited and scared and ready all at the same time. I know it will be good though. So to Holly, who is back in town, I love you and I am ready! Let's do this thing!

So today is interesting. It is always interesting when you show up to
work wearing a cowboy hat. There is a singles barn dance tonight so I
figured I would get dressed beforehand. People at work are like "howdy
tex". Anytime someone notices I go into my Texas accent and say "howdy".
I noticed that no one in Dallas wears cowboy hats anymore. I guess it
isn't as popular as it used to be. The glory days of cowboy hats were
the 70s and 80s, with country music being very popular and the show
Dallas making everyone think we are all JR Ewing. Nowadays the only
cowboy stuff we have are brokeback mountain, and that is nothing to want
to aspire to. Now in Wichita Falls about half of the population still
wears them. So if you want the ole Texas hospitability just go anywhere
but Dallas. In other news after work we are picking up the wedding
rings. It'll be official. At some point in time we'll need a marriage
license. I haven't actually thought about that. I haven't studied for a
marriage test to get the license. I do remember you are supposed to look
both ways at stop signs so I've got that down. Parallel Parking though
is always tricky. I guess I should bring a horse and have him go in
sideways. Then I'll be a complete Texan. Me an the little lady will
wrastle up some grub and call it an evening, ya'll.

Joke
How'd the redneck git lost in space?
He rolled down the window to spit out his chaw!

As I am starting to read the reviews of the iPhone it looks pretty
promising. The only thing I don't get is that these reviews are acting
like checking email and surfing the web from a phone is a new thing. I
have been doing that since 2002. PocketPC phones have been running
around since then and they have been doing everything the iPhone has.
The only thing, and I mean only thing, the iPhone does that the others
don't is be able to view youtube videos on the phone. I also question
whether the iPhone can work with the SlingBox - the coolest app for
mobile phones out there, allowing you to stream and control your home TV
on your phone. I haven't been a fan of Apple in a long time. They
overprice everything. The only advantage they have is style and form and
maybe simplicity. That is why the iPod was so successful. Congrats go
out to my brother-in-laws company that makes the Jawbone headset. They
are marketing the Jawbone with the iPhone. It is the rich person's
headset. They must've gotten someone to really market their product.
Their past has taught me a lesson. You can have the best product in the
world but if you can't market it, you've got nothing. Will I get the
iPhone? Well, I have Verizon and if it is available my next phone I may
get it. Provided it works with the SlingBox.

Joke
A little boy was in a relative's wedding. As he was coming down the
aisle he would take two steps, stop and turn to the crowd (alternating
between bride's side and groom's side). While facing the crowd, he would
put his hands up like claws and roar. So it went, step, step, "ROAR,"
step, step, "ROAR," all the way down the aisle. As you can imagine, the
crowd was near tears from laughing so hard by the time he reached the
pulpit.
The little boy, however, was getting more and more distressed from all
the laughing, and was also near tears by the time he reached the pulpit.

When asked what he was doing, the child sniffed and said, "I was being
the Ring Bear."

This morning I was thinking about lightning. What if there was no lightning and the atmosphere was never unstable enough to produce it? Ben Franklin would have never discovered electricity. The light bulb would have never been invented. The twentieth century would have never happened and we'd be still writing things with our hands. I was reading a book called "Software Creativity 2.0" and it pointed out something I hadn't thought of. Practice sometimes precedes theory. It is the reverse of the scientific method. Meaning things are put into motion and then we figure out how it works. Take the airplane for example. Wings were invented before we knew about how it works. In my life I tend to just do things without theorizing and testing all possible outcomes, however I do test many. Take marriage for example. If I didn't love Holly I wouldn't be doing it, but I don't know what is going to happen when we do get married. Now if I was stuck in theory land all I would be doing would be testing things and making sure they are safe. If the Wright brothers would've waited and figured out how wings worked we would've been farther behind in flight now. So as I get closer to that day I am thinking about being an explorer of marriage. This will be unknown to me, and untested. But it will work because we both have sacrificial love and that is true love in practice. These are the voyages of the starship marriage. It's ongoing mission, to figure out what in the world we are getting ourselves into ;-)

Joke
"I'm really enjoying this marriage thing. You think about each other, you care about each other. It's wonderful. Plus, I love saying 'my wife'. Once I started saying it, I couldn't stop. 'My wife' this, 'My wife' that. It's an amazing way to begin a sentence."
- Jerry, in "The Wife"

This weekend was good. I saw the new Transformers movie on Friday. It was good, a little confusing in some parts but still good. Naturally it was a plot created in the 80s... Anyways, on Saturday Holly and I went to Peetey's house and Holly got to socialize with my friends I've had since I was in 4th grade. On Sunday we took care of the 2 year old Sunday School class. That was an experience. What are you supposed to do when a kid is screaming,"I want my mommy and daddy!Waaahhh" I just said, eat your cookie. Eventually when I started reading some of them a story he calmed down. Later that afternoon I gave the message at the homeless ministry. One guy wanted a copy of it and another guy said that was exactly what he needed to hear. It feels good to know you aren't just taking up space when you prepare and deliver a message. I also included the audio. This is from the second stop. The first stop we do is at a mission and I actually stayed close to what I was preaching about. The second stop we do is at a resource center where people don't even care what you are saying, so I usually go back to the root of salvation when I am there because they just don't get it. It's one thing to just be a benchwarmer on Sunday, but to get out in the game is a thrill as well. Enjoy.

click for the audio

click to read it

One month and counting! In one month I will be joined with my fiance in marriage. It is exciting. I am happily in love. Last night we met for pre-marital counseling with the minister who is going to marry us. We had to take a "compatibility" test a while back and he went over the results. It was just a test but we scored 100% on parts like religion, family, and communication. Both of us were in the "flexible" category, which is good cause it means we can adapt to hardship. We did have some stuff to work on, like assertiveness. I am bad at being assertive on negative things, I avoid conflict whenever I can. I am assertive on positive things and since I am a positive person I really don't have much to worry about. I am going to go from 32 years of being single, 9 years of living alone to being with someone for the rest of my life. Talk about change. Everyone I have talked to about marriage all say this,"Marriage is not better, just different." I am ready for it though. I have played the field, lived the band lifestyle, experienced singleness to its fullest, partied and really enjoyed being single. I am ready now. Marriage here I come!

Joke
Why did the calf cross the street?
To get to the udder side.

This weekend was finally a standard weekend. On Friday I took Holly to Rafain's Brazilian Chucharesca - the place where we are having our rehearsal dinner. It has some of the best food, with 12 cuts of meat being served at your table you are sure to get full. Top that with the dessert bar which has the best chocolate cake. Yummy. That has to be my favorite restaurant of all time. When I walked in the lady recognized me, but thought I was a different groom and she said the party was waiting for me. Holly and I are like,"Wha?" Eventually she figured it out. Then we topped the evening off at Dave and Buster's getting over 3000 tickets on our D&B card. I think we have enough tickets for a D&B T-Shirt. But we probably spent way more money than the T-Shirt will ever be. I just keep the tickets on the card and we add to it every time we go. If I get like 260,000 tickets I can get an XBox360. It probably costs $25,000 to win 260,000 tickets to get a $499 XBox. Is that a deal or what? Saturday the new bedroom furniture arrived. It went smooth and my bedroom now smells of rich mahogany. I am sleeping in the guest bedroom until we get married so the new bed will be an experience for both of us. Sunday we did the usual church, Sunday school, lunch, homeless stuff. Sunday is one of our busiest days. Anyways, how was your weekend?

Joke
A man and his wife entered a dentist's office.
The wife said, "I want a tooth pulled. I don't want gas or Novocain because I'm in a terrible hurry. Just pull the tooth as quickly as possible."
"You're a brave woman," said the dentist. "Now, show me which tooth it is."
The wife turns to her husband and says: "Open your mouth and show the dentist which tooth it is, dear."

Hmm, what to talk about. I am bored right now so this is gonna be long. I think I will talk about every one's favorite subject, movies and Hollywood. Now as I was coding last night I put it on one of the movie channels. The first little diddy was about how a guy - Greg Kinnear - makes friends with an assassin and they help each other out. It was boring. The second movie was right after it called "June Bug". It was a chick flick I think. It was just so extremely boring I had to laugh at it. I mean there were shots of an empty living room, empty dining room, empty bedroom, all lasting a minute or more. I could tell it was just filler because they didn't know what to put. Hollywood is wondering why their business is sinking and they blame things like piracy and DVDs but the reality is their movies are boring. So here is some advice for Hollywood if they want better movies:
1. Enough with the mindless banter. Yes Clerks was funny in the 90s but to have every movie have pointless conversations just because it was cool is no longer necessary. Matter of fact it makes the movies boring and it is obvious that it is filler.
2. Enough with the Reality Show look. Yes, we know how real people look and we know what life is like in the normal world. People in Hollywood think that playing a drunken old guy who has been through alot is interesting. Hello Hollywood. They are all around us and not very entertaining. Plus the reality camera angles and "off-the-cuff" style is disorienting and pointless.
3. Enough with swearing just because it is edgy. Hello Hollywood. We don't need to watch people swear. On top of the whole "what kind of message does it give our kids" mentality it shows the main characters intellect. People who swear a lot are generally not that smart and I lose all interest in them as a character. It is not cool to swear and it dumbs down society. Thank you Hollywood for that.
4. Enough with movies filmed in LA and New York. I'd be willing to bet that 90% of all movies are filmed in LA and New York. Hello Hollywood. There are other places to film. It is plainly obvious to me that I am looking at a low budget movie when all they do is drive around Santa Monica Boulevard. I know Dallas has a movie studio around here. Why not make more movies in Dallas?
5. Comedies don't need to be gross to be funny. I can do without throw-up. I can do without innuendo. Hello Hollywood. Whenever I see any kind of gross thing in any movie automatically it drops a grade in my book. I have never laughed at gross things, I just get sick from watching it. Come on people. If I wanted to laugh at gross things I'd hang out in a hospital.
6. Sequels - Come on. Hello Hollywood. Ever since the 80s when sequels were big every producer decides to make them. Even for movies that are bad. We didn't need a Matrix 2 and Matrix 3. We don't need many sequels, especially since I think we have learned a valuable lesson over these years - Sequels are never as good as the original.

So those are the big ones. If you take those out of all of the movies in the last 5 years you might have just a handful of movies that make it. I can see the 80s being called the golden age of movies because the plots were really entertaining. Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Star Trek, ET and a host of other really good movies, too many to mention. I would say that it is just that I was a kid in the 80s, but the quality of movies today is just glaring. So what can Hollywood do to make better movies?
1. Create movies with subplots - It is good when there is more than one plot in a movie.
2. Create movies with definite endings - I like to see movies that I know will not have sequels.
3. Create movies with new actors - I have seen every major actor out there 5 times at least. Give us some new major actors and actresses.
4. Create movies with better music - The scores of the 80s were very good. Nowadays they are boring.
5. Create movies with lovable characters - like I said, swearing and grossness make characters not lovable.
6. Bring back morality - I remember there used to be movies where a good guy was an actual good guy, not a guy who could kill a man in self defense and still be called good. How about a character who refuses to do wrong even if it benefits him to do so? I mean, the current Superman has an illegitimate child. Come on, that doesn't sound that super. Plus the string of chick flicks that give women an excuse to cheat on their man if they no longer love them leaves us all worried for the future. Don't get me wrong. I was actually defending Family Guy even though it is tasteless. There is a time and place, but there are just no moral movies anymore. Hollywood, give us more than one a year.

So those are just some suggestions. I could go on and on about Hollywood. I doubt they will listen to me. But if they did I'd be willing to bet that movies would get better and be more entertaining. For now the up and coming movies from obscure places and even the Internet will probably start gaining in popularity until Hollywood gets the message.

Joke
A wise old gentleman retired and purchased a modest home near a junior high school. He spent the first few weeks of his retirement in peace and contentment. Then a new school year began. The very next afternoon three young boys, full of youthful, after-school enthusiasm, came down his street, beating merrily on every trash can they encountered. The crashing percussion continued day after day, until finally the wise old man decided it was time to take some action.
The next afternoon, he walked out to meet the young percussionists as they banged their way down the street. Stopping them, he said, "You kids are a lot of fun. I like to see you express your exuberance like that. In fact, I used to do the same thing when I was your age. Will you do me a favor? I'll give you each a dollar if you'll promise to come around every day and do your thing."

The kids were elated and continued to do a bang-up job on the trashcans.

After a few days, the old-timer greeted the kids again, but this time he had a sad smile on his face. "This recession's really putting a big dent in my income," he told them. "From now on, I'll only be able to pay you 50 cents to beat on the cans."

The noisemakers were obviously displeased, but they accepted his offer and continued their afternoon ruckus. A few days later, the wily retiree approached them again as they drummed their way down the street.

"Look," he said, "I haven't received my Social Security check yet, so I'm not going to be able to give you more than 25 cents. Will that be okay?"

"A freakin' quarter?" the drum leader exclaimed. "If you think we're going to waste our time, beating these cans around for a quarter, you're nuts! No way, dude. We quit!" And the old man enjoyed peace and serenity for the rest of his days.

Well, the fourth was pretty fun. Holly and I went out to get bedroom furniture for the house. We got a king size bed, frame, 2 dressers and 2 nightstands. We both liked it. Then we went to see the fireworks in Lewisville. We camped out at the Best Buy parking lot. That was an easy drive. It looked like they finally got some new looking fireworks. For years they would all look the same. Now they had ones that sizzled and ones that twisted. I also like the death star ones that look like a circle around the center. The wedding is of course forefront on the mind. Right now I need all the guys to get fitted for their tuxes ASAP. It is happening in just 1 month and 6 days. I'll blink and be married...

Joke
A mother was sitting on the couch reading a book when one of her children walked up to her and said, "Mummy, why is my name Petal?"
The mother replied, "Because when you were born, a petal fell on your head."
The next baby walked up and asked, "Mummy why is my name Rose?" she replied,
"Because when you were born, a rose fell on your head." The last baby walked up to her and said, "BLAS CLAFLAS YIFRASSAM TASSM POONNFFFIINRTY."
The mother replied, "Please be quiet, Fridge."

I think I am getting weddings on the brain. This weekend we went to a wedding in Orange, Texas. Orange, Texas is near Port Arthur which is near Houston close to the Louisiana Border. Basically it took 6 hours to get there and 6 hours hours back so that was a lot of driving. I did a quarter of it. We went as a big Sunday School group. I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express both Friday and Saturday night so now I can solve all of the world's problems. The wedding was good. I guess I will eventually see all my married friends in the married Sunday school classes. It kind of feels like a graduation from the singles classes. On Saturday night we ate at a Cajun seafood place near the ocean. I had steak of course. I also bought a cool little shellacked alligator head. I named it "Alli". Of course the rain hit us the whole way there and back. I noticed this morning how all of the trees look like they are growing extra branches. The grass is green and high. It is like Texas is becoming tropical. I should get a boat so I can boat to work. That'd be cool.

Joke
The Lone Ranger and Tonto were camping out one night. Tonto, after having a very bad dream, woke up to see the stars up above him. He woke the Lone Ranger and said to him, "What you think?"

The Lone Ranger replies reassuringly, "Well, Tonto, it's like this, God gives us miracles in life. Each day is a new beginning, just like every night there's a new star in the sky. What do you think?"

Tonto looks at him, confused and says, "Tonto think someone stole tent."