who wants to be cancelled?

Golden's dad likes to watch trivia game shows. I like watching them, too. This past weekend we watched several episodes of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire on the Game Show Network, as that is apparently his ritual in the early evening. As I was watching TV with him, I started thinking about the year or two when game shows were the shows to watch in primetime.

There was Millionaire, Greed, 21, Pyramid, and a myriad of others. If game shows were so popular then, why aren't they popular now? Tastes in television can't possibly be as fickle as tastes in clothing, can they? I know that if there is a style of show I like now, it is likely that I will like that style of show next year and the year after that. That is exactly how I feel about cotton t-shirts as well, though, so maybe I am not the best example.

I think I know why game shows are no longer popular. When ABC realized that Millionaire was getting great ratings they determined that they could drop half their primetime lineup and fill in the blanks with the one game show. If people like watching Regis once a week they'll love seeing him three times a week. I remember thinking that was so stupid because rather than having a show that would perform well for several years in a primetime slot, everyone (including myself) got sick of one more night of game shows on the Who Wants to Be a Millionaire network (A.K.A. ABC). I would probably still have watched the show if it were only on once a week, but two or three times became overkill and I stopped feeling like tuning it in.

I see this happening today as well. The Apprentice got great ratings for three seasons, so NBC decided it was time to add a new Apprentice to milk more money out of the franchise. They shouldn't have been surprised when ratings for both Donald Trump's and Martha Stewart's versions of the show disappointed.

There is one exception that I have noticed to what I am talking about, and I don't understand it. There are concurrently three different versions of Law & Order and CSI on the networks in primetime this season. How they get people to watch all three, I'll never know.

a vacation from my vacation

Like people all over the United States, Golden and I spent the bulk of our time over Thanksgiving vacation with family. It was a marathon of sorts, as we spent all day Thursday with her Grandparents from her dad's side, Friday morning and afternoon with my grandmother from my dad's side, Friday evening with her grandfather on her mom's side, and Saturday afternoon with her grandparents from her dad's side again. We love our grandparents and wish we could see them more, but in less stressful circumstances.

Now that I have got my holiday whining out of the way, Golden and I have an announcement. We likely won't go on another non-holiday vacation for many years to come because somewhere around July 15, 2006, we will have a new addition to the family. Golden is six or seven weeks along. If you have questions that are more detailed than that you may want to ask her on her blog. We announced the news to family over the Thanksgiving holiday, and are now announcing to friends, acquaintances, and people who stumble across our sites. We were going to delay the announcement to the end of the first trimester, but we decided to let the cat out of the bag since we would be seeing so much family this past weekend.

you know you're online too much...

...when you have to explain why you won't be posting for the next four days before a holiday.

You may have noticed that I uncharacteristically posted something on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and now Wednesday. The reason: I won't be posting again until at least this Sunday.

Golden and I will be seeing some of her family that we haven't seen in three years, so she is excited about that. I like a lot of Thanksgiving food, so I am excited about that. Neither of us likes to drive, so we aren't excited about the trip (to fam).

What else is there to say? Happy Thanksgiving!

i need a big cup

Every morning I get two drinks--water and coffee. I sometimes substitute tea for coffee, but the purpose is almost always the same. Wake me up and replace morning breath with coffee or tea breath. I slowly wake up as I drink my coffee in the morning, and so I am much more clear-headed at 11AM than I am at 8AM. Lately, there has been a problem at work that has stifled my plans.

When I get my coffee in the morning I use a large cup. I get a smaller cup of water, because its purpose is more to offset the coffee than to quench thirst. For about two weeks, though, there were only small cups in the kitchen and in the area where the spare styrofoam cups are stored. I had to either make due on less caffeine or make two trips to the kitchen. That's a hard decision because I am so incredibly lazy.

Near the end of last week I spotted something that my mind accompanied with a heavenly chorus and a light from above. The large styrofoam cups were back! I think I am going to need to take preparatory action this time around, and stash some big cups before the next drought. I don't know if I can last through another one.

stroud's

One of my closer friends from college visited me this past week, and as we were discussing where to eat after service on Sunday night (eight days ago), he recommended Stroud's South, which is on 85th street in south KCMO. He had heard that the place is going to be shut down (login required) soon to make way for widening the street.

It's kind of funny to me that at least in the Kansas City area, the restaurants that people seem to find the most appealing seem like little more than holes in the wall when you get there. We showed up at the restaurant around 8:30 PM, and it was almost full, but we did find a parking spot. The food was good, very much like homestyle fried chicken, to the point where my only complaint is that it may be a little too close to home fried chicken. I think my body is starting to expect a KFC experience whenever I eat chicken.

It's kind of a shame the place will have to shut down and move. Maybe they'll put it somewhere closer to where I live, though. My stomach will be thankful, but my heart won't.

typhoid dust

I have had a cold lately. It hasn't been a huge deal, but I have been very conscious about the likelihood of spreading the contagion around the places I go. I almost skipped work on Friday, but opted to go because we are very short-handed. I almost didn't go to Elevate PM (young adult group) because we would be visiting older people in the area, but I went and was simply very careful not to do things that would spread germs (like sneezing into my hand then shaking hands with someone).

This morning I went to Sunday School, but skipped the main service because I didn't figure that most people would feel comfortable shaking hands with someone who sounds like he is hacking up a lung. I couldn't just not shake hands, because that would seem rude. I also can think of nothing but curling up in a blanket when I am in this condition.

Anyway, how am I to handle a serious cold? Should I lock myself away from the world, or should I go about with business as usual? I never really know how to handle this sort of thing because it isn't as definitive a sickness as the flu, but it is still contagious and keeps me from wanting to participate in too much activity. I just don't want to make everyone else sick right before the holidays.

conspiracy theory

A couple of days ago I was in a minor disagreement with a coworker about something that was insignificant in the grand scheme of things. While we were getting into it he pointed out part of the reason I am unwilling to agree with a lot of things that I hear people say. I don't take kindly to conspiracy theories.

That is actually true. I tend to view a conspiracy theory as absolute proof that the theorist is wrong. I believe that conspiracy theories are generally concocted by people who really want something to be true so much that they are willing to create elaborate stories for why that something is true. It's also more comforting to blame the things we don't like on malicious people.

Why didn't your favorite politician get elected? It's those darn ballot mills in shady precincts. Why doesn't your kid do well in school? The entire administration from the principle to the teachers is out to get you and yours. Why didn't you get hired by NASA to be an astronaut? NASA doesn't hire astronauts. They hire actors to jump around on a Hollywood set.

This isn't to say I don't enjoy some conspiracy theories. I remember one person telling me that the Federal taxes were a sham because the government doesn't need any money. How could the government need money if that same government can print all it needs? That got a restrained chuckle. I give the same type of reaction when I hear other conspiracies such as that automotive industry is holding back production on a car that can run completely on water or when I hear someone speak seriously about back masking (remember that?).

So if you see me rolling my eyes when someone goes on about how the Illuminati are really the ones running everything, or that Proctor & Gamble is owned by Satanists, or that all barcodes have been encoded with a 666 in preparation for the mark of the beast, please forgive me. The transceiver that the CIA implanted in my skull sometimes causes me to twitch like that.

home remedies

Golden is currently suffering from an earache that has been bothering her since late last night. This has caused her quite a bit of pain, and it was much worse last night. Due to the severity of the issue we decided to investigate potential home remedies online. In our searching, we came across the following helpful suggestions.

• Colloidal silver
• Echinacea
• Lobelia and garlic oil
• Juice from mango leaves
• Aconite
• Wolfsbane

Are you kidding me? Who has colloidal silver or lobelia just laying around the house? What kind of people do these remedies really help? I am as likely to find the Holy Grail, or Venus de Milo's arms, or Gary Coleman in my house as I am to find aconite or wolfsbane. At least I would recognize Gary Coleman if I saw him.

I eventually went to Osco Drug last night to get some ear medication. It has chamomilla, mercurius solubilis, sulphur, and glycerin. I guess that proves I don't need all that other stuff to cure an earache. It also proves that anything can be made funny by simply mentioning Gary Coleman.

known

Sunday's lesson in church was on being known. It mostly centered on the desire to know and be known by your spouse, but eventually worked its way into being known by God. There were two things about the lesson that got me to think.

First, I want very much to be known for who I am rather than who I portray. That is actually part of the point of this blog. I hate people having the wrong ideas about me. Even more, I hate when I feel I have no choice but to let people have the wrong ideas about me.

This is something that I think is one of the main strengths of Golden's and my relationship. We are continually trying to find out everything about each other.

Second, and more important, was a statement made toward the end of class. The author of the book we are studying makes the statement that unless we feel lovable, we cannot accept God's love for us. When I read the book that sounded right, but then in class I thought about a passage of Scripture that seems to dispute that claim. I think I have resolved the paradox in my head now, though.

Here is the complication. I know that I have seen people in the past unable to accept God's love due to how wretched they feel about themselves. I also know that I have seen more people who feel they don't need God because they feel quite lovable. To complicate things further, when we say that God is love we are pulling from a passage that claims that God's love for us is so strong that He sacrificed for us while we were sinners (and probably not too lovable).

You'll have to forgive any inappropriateness in this analogy, but I think through it I understand the solution. I think that God is probably a little like a woman who sees an attractive man with what she deems horrible personality defects. Both God and the woman see the potential and make the determination that, "I can change him!" The difference between God and the woman is that God really can properly change him.

If that is the case, then in order to accept God's love we need to feel that we have the potential to be lovable.

humor me

I was reading through some back page type news articles the other day and came across one entitled, "Women May Enjoy Humor More, if It's Funny." This got me thinking about the difference between mine and Golden's sense of humor.

In order to understand our senses of humor, you would have to look back to how our humor was influenced in our more formative years.

Golden grew up watching TV and movies with her brother and his friends, and so the humor that the article described as male is not far from what she enjoys. She tends to laugh at physical humor and bathroom humor.

I had some male influences on my humor (my dad and a few friends), but some of the strongest influences come from my mom, my sister, and one of my aunts. I tend to laugh at wordplays, banter, and satire.

Unlike what the story said should be the case Golden tends to laugh at things prior to analyzing whether they should be funny. I do the opposite and analyze the joke to death in my mind. Sometimes I have to think about something for a while before determining whether I truly believe it is funny. Once I do, I tend to overenjoy the joke by recalling it to mind at random times of the day.

Golden likes the fact that I work mostly with men because it helps me appreciate her humor more. On the flip side, though, my humor is like a commercial jingle that you don't like at first, but later on you can't get out of your head (Co - stan - za). So, joking around people for an extended period of time makes them use my humor more, which reinforces my humor on myself.

It is the circle of humor in my life.

dear ________,

I have never been good about writing letters. In fact, I am very bad at it. I don't know why. I just am.

When I moved 800 miles from home to go to college, I think my mom expected me to write more. I may have written to her twice. It was more than I wrote to anyone else, though, so it's not like she was the only person to whom I did not send enough letters.

Eventually, my mom got a sense of humor about the whole thing and wrote a letter for me that I was supposed to fill out and send back to her. Golden came across that letter a few days ago. What Golden found was a copy, so I think that I actually did fill out the letter and send it back. Here's what the letter says (the names have been changed to protect blah, blah, blah) .

---

Date __________

Dear _______,

a. Dad

b. Mom

c. Miss Carisma

d. All of the above

I am doing ________

a. fine

b. wonderful

c. so-so

d. terrible

My classes are ________

a. interesting

b. challenging

c. too easy

d. boring

My job is _______

a. going well

b. a piece of cake

c. too much to handle

I've been spending the majority of my time _______

a. studying

b. sleeping

c. on the phone

d. socializing

The food is ______

a. just like home cooking

b. better than home cooking

c. like Mrs. O'Mealy's

d. now I know what cardboard tastes like

I think about you _______

a. all the time

b. on occasion

c. almost never

d. "What was your name again?"

Please send _______

a. money

b. food

c. a plane ticket home

d. ___________

My least favorite class is ________________

because ____________________________

My favorite class is ___________________

because ____________________________

Well, I had better go.

Your _______,

a. loving son

b. adoring brother

c. friend

d. __________

Dust

fall

When Golden and I bought our house I viewed the three trees in the front yard and two in the back as positives that provide shade in the summer and maintain the value of the property. I didn't think through the fact that deciduous trees shed their leaves in autumn.

It seems every neighbor I have happily spends their time blowing or vacuuming their leaves into bags, even though the majority of the leaves are still in the trees. This does not seem right. I tried something like that last year but was simply frustrated when, after raking the yard for an afternoon, the yard looked about the same the next day. I eventually decided to leave (ha!) a coating of this tree trash in the yard throughout the winter and mowed it up last April. I don't know what I am going to do about it this year.

vandalized

I generally view vandalism as a stupid crime that I hope I don't have to deal with. Who wants to pay to have a keyed car repaired or a spray painted wall cleaned? I had to smile at the defacement that I saw a couple of blocks from my house yesterday, though.

On the way to church I noticed a change on the sign for a housing development near my house that wasn't there the day before. Later, Golden and I drove by to snap a picture, but there were three or four people near the sign and I didn't want to raise suspicion that I was the perpetrator come back to revel at the scene of the crime. I drove around for a couple of minutes then Golden snapped the picture quickly as we passed the sign again.

It brought a smile to my day, so maybe it will bring a smile to yours as well.

confession

Today's theme in church seemed to be confession. Forrest opened our class up with an ice breaker to discuss any bad attitudes we had about church. In the main service the title of the sermon was "Confession." This is a very long post, so I don't expect everyone to read through it. As T might say, I have no pictures, so I decided to use a thousand words.

I must confess (and I did confess in class very honestly) that I actually have always disliked going to church. After the way I described my feelings this morning, I feel I need to have a post that more completely explains the cause of those feelings. Someone who didn't know me might have thought I hated everything about church if they heard my "confession."

I was always a little jealous of the people who looked forward to Sunday services, because the day actually filled me with a sort of dread. I always hated dressing up because I didn't really ever see the point, and dressy clothes are uncomfortable. I don't have much of a need for people to look at me and notice my clothes, and that could be the main purpose for dressy clothes. I think, though I am not sure, that a lot of people who say they like to go to church like it because they can show off their clothes. It isn't really a bad or a good reason, but it certainly isn't a motivating factor for me.

People may also enjoy church because they get to talk with friends. This is something that I do like about church. As a kid, though, it was rough because boys don't want to sit around and talk. They want to run around and do things that will destroy the dressy clothes that they are wearing. Any more I wear jeans, so that isn't a problem. :)

Some people like corporate worship. I like it too, kind of. I have found, though, that my worship is very personal, so I tend to block everything and everyone else out in my worship. I could do that at home, but I don't, so it is a good reason to go to church.

I want to address the three reasons beyond dressing up that I have had a bad attitude about church.

First, I hate to see people put on a show that doesn't match up with their real life. This hasn't been a big issue for me lately, because I have noticed that there isn't really such a thing as a person who is 100% genuine and there isn't such a thing as a person who is 100% fake. I just have to work on not being fake myself.

I have also noticed that some characteristics that I thought were fake in other people were actually the furthest thing from fake. I have to be more careful before judging.

The second reason is something that we mentioned in class, which is marketing within the church. Sometimes stuff gets hyped up into something it isn't. Really, that isn't a good reason to have a bad attitude about church, though, so I don't need to focus on that. So long as I am not expected to be a salesperson I'll deal.

The third reason for my bad attitude is the one that has gotten to me the most throughout my life. Within my denomination I have classified three types of preachers: the bad, the good, and the great. I classify them based on the typical sermon content.

The bad preachers focus on what I believe to be neither milk nor meat, but rather spiritual cotton candy. This is very typical for some traveling evangelists who believe that they can substitute Scriptural teaching with half-hour rants about Hollywood or the end times. I am very thankful that my pastor makes it a point to stay away from the cotton candy.

The good preachers teach milk almost exclusively. This isn't really a bad thing, because the milk is the necessities. The author of Hebrews describes the following as milky topics: repentance, faith, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. I certainly don't think any of it is unessential, but these are topics that the mature in faith should not need instruction in.

The great preachers teach milk and meat. Unfortunately, if a preacher only taught meat, half the congregation would probably not be ready for it. Therefore, no relevant preacher can focus only on meat. Based on Hebrews 5, I assume the details of the New Covenant are what best represent meat.

There is very little of the milk topics that I don't already understand, and there is a lot about the meat topics that I don't understand. When I hear a sermon on a topic for the fiftieth or one hundredth time in my life I realize that there are probably people who need to hear that sermon. Maybe I do too and I just don't realize it. I have a hard time with my attitude, nonetheless.

This is going to sound arrogant, but I sometimes feel like the kid in school who already knows what the teacher is going to say. I look forward to and crave the meat that I have never tasted. I feel like I have to go through a lot of milk to get to that meat. I know it's out there. How do I find it?

cheesed

Every once in a while I get sick to my stomach at night and can only get comfortable enough to sleep by -- um -- spending some time in the bathroom. This hasn't happened to me for several months, so I figured it was something that had been temporary and that I was past. That was until a couple of nights ago when it happened again. It was only then that I deduced the root cause.

One of my favorite late night snacks is cheese and crackers. I usually eat colby or cheddar, but I have been known to use cream cheese as well. The crackers have to be saltines. The very thought of a slice of colby between two saltines makes my mouth water.

As my face was hovering over the toilet bowl something occurred to me. Those offerings that I had given to the porcelain altar in the past have always been very similar. Every time I had gotten sick I had eaten saltines and colby cheese shortly before. I was satisfied with that discovery, but it was only an hour and a half later that my stomach was satisfied enough that it would let me go to sleep.

Does this mean that I will not be eating colby and crackers any more? Of course not. It just means I won't gorge myself on half the package of cheese like I did that night.

pet rock

I don't generally care to dress up for things. This includes wearing costumes. For this reason I had decided that I would not do a costume for Halloween this year. There wasn't much point, anyway, because I didn't have significant Halloween plans. Then I found out a contest at work would include decent prizes. Since I either go all out or don't do anything at all I went from doing nothing to going all out.

A couple of years ago I had considered being a pet rock for Halloween, mostly because it is something that few other people would think about. That year I dressed as a "Jump to Conclusions" mat instead. This year I decided to try the pet rock idea.

All Sunday I put together the different elements of the costume. I got two trash bags and painted them white and gray and added some green moss. I stuffed the trash bags with newspaper to give a bulgy rock look. I also created a collar out of elastic and added a "Rock" name tag, and created a pet rock carrying case.

Unfortunately, my costume did not place in the contest, so the work was mostly for naught. I also learned that newspaper is an excellent insulator, because I was pretty warm by the end of the session. I have to focus on the positive, though. I did learn that if you set your mind to something and give it your best you can end up with two painted trash bags and an elastic leash within a day's time.