By God's grace...

*NOW PLAYING:*
Song: This Is Your Time
Artist: Michael W. Smith
Album: This Is Your Time
Quote: "This is your time, this is your chance, live every moment, leave nothing to chance... swim in the sea, drink of the deep, embrace the mystery of all you can be..."
* * *

Wow...... what a week... On Monday morning, I experienced something I never thought I would (and hope I never will again)... my father suffered a heart attack at home and had to be rushed to the hospital. I thank God that he has recovered fully from this traumatic experience and is now at home, back to his old self. It is truly God's blessing that my family is still intact and by His grace that all the various circumstances during the incident worked out for the best. My dad's newfound zeal for life and ministry has also been an inspiriation and after his recovery, he has vowed to allow God to use him more for God's will than his own. The care and prayers from friends and church members has also been extraordinary and I truly believe that their prayers contributed to the practically seamless recovery by my dad. Again, truly God's blessing. It is amazing to think of how short this time on Earth is, and how God can call us to leave this place and enter our eternal home in Heaven at any time. Any number of circumstances can take us or our family away from us. I surely hope that when that day arrives for me, I will be able to look back and see that I have impacted someone in a positive way, helped people, left an impression on people, and allow people to smile and say, "he was a child of God".

On the downside, I've gotta do two reports and two presentations on Tuesday... grrrr. This will be a busy weekend. :P

Switchfoot concert coming up! Hope I can get tickets...

Detroit Pistons: 2004 NBA Champs! Dethronin' LA!

*NOW PLAYING:*
Song: "Inside Outside"
Artist: Delirious
Album: World Service
Quote: "...'cause You still captivate me, fascinate me... you still captivate me, saturate me..."
* * *

Woohoo! LA goes down and Detroit wins a well-earned NBA championship with amazing D, team ball, and pure hustle. Sweet ending!

Presentations class....hrm, coulda gone better... but everyone was really nervous and rattled 'cause now the presentations actually count for marks. It's gonna be tough to get high marks for presentations and reports in this class... eek.

Did some work over the weekend with Andrew, I worked on reports while he studied for his MCATS. We were able to head over the court a couple times to ball a bit. My game's making progress and somewhat getting to where I want it to be... jumpshot is still waaaay lacking, especially in games, but I'm working on it... My D has picked up, pretty close to where I used to be, probably 'cause I'm feeling a little more in shape and quicker than when summer began. My first step is still a step slower than where I want it to be and I could still work on ballhandling, but it's getting better. Passing is still where it used to be, but gotta watch those TOs. Fun stuff though.

Got a meeting with my local church's worship team this Thursday... my neighbour invited me to just go and check it out and meet some people who live in the Bridlewood area who also enjoy worship music and recording. I'm excited but also a little nervous 'cause I would know absolutely nobody and I don't know if my style of music fits with theirs... they do contemporary worship but more of the old-school brand. Guess we'll see how that turns out.

On a sad note, I had to turn down Lyle Johnson's request for me to play for him at Arlington Woods Church again.... grrrr... stupid Presentations class. :P I hope he calls back again sometime with another gig 'cause I really enjoy leading worship with him but he just seems to always ask me when I'm busy! Ah well.

Here's an idea that I've discussed with my neighbour about doing over the summer... an outdoor neighbourhood praise/outreach event where we can set up outside, have a worship team playing, food, activities for the kids, and just rock the neighbourhood. It'd be a good way of bringing the christians in the community together and hopefully, outreach to the non-christians. My original idea had a person's driveway in mind as the 'stage area', but my neighbour said we might be able to use her church's parking lot. Definite possibilities... hrm...

With or Without You

*NOW PLAYING:*
Song: With or Without You
Artist: Grits feat. Jadyn Maria
Album: In the Name of Love - Artists United for Africa
* * *


To Shannon,
Heya, remember that remixed hip-hop U2 song we heard in the car? I found out who sang it! The U2 song With or Without You is sung by Grits featuring Jadyn Maria (click on the album picture to find out more and to hear a sound clip). Apparently, this album features only hit songs by U2 but redone by many of today's hottest christian artists (I recognize most of the names here, some of which are my faves). It looks like a really cool album! ...tempted to pick it up now. Heheh. :)

Detroit Bad Boys now 1-1... L-A, L-A, whatcha gonna do?

*NOW PLAYING:*
Song: "Take Me Away"
Artist: Lifehouse
Album: Stanley Climbfall
Quote: "I've seen enough and it's never enough, it keeps leaving me needing you, take me away..."
* * *

Whew! It's been somewhat busy and exhausting lately. Man, this Business Communications Skills class (Presentations) is no joke! ... with a report and presentation due each week. I really hope Koppel doesn't come into the classroom! Last night's presentation actually went quite well, I thought, though I haven't looked at the tape just yet. It's definitely an improvement over last week, where I froze about 10 seconds into my presentation and stumbled through it the rest of the way...:P Apparently, when I present, I pace a bit, play with my tie a bit, say the word "now" a lot, and don't change my facial expressions much... hm... Makes me wonder what kind of idiot I must look like when I do worship leading at church every Sunday in front of almost 100 people. :P I dunno how people can just get up there and present so effectively and talk as if it was so easy... One of my class members was a former GeeGee cheerleader, I heard, and man, she can present on absolutely any topic with enthusiasm and energy... definitely props to people like her. It's definitely a tough course... I can't imagine how people take it throughout the year, it's so time consuming! .....oh, and I caught gas at 73.9 on the way home... jackpot, baby! :P

Last night, caught the final few minutes of Game 2 of the NBA Finals between the Detroit Pistons and Los Angeles Lakers. Whew! Boy was I glad I caught it... what a finish! I was so glad to see Detroit win the first game and it looked like they were gonna pull a two game lead in the series before heading back to Detroit for 3 games... Then a certain player in #8 (...or was that a shadow of #23) knocks down a HUGE clutch 3-ptr to turn the game into overtime, where LA eventually won the game. I was never a Kobe fan, but I had to give him props for that shot... he's no doubt a clutch player, as he's demonstrated many games in the past. Great game, great plays. Hoping Detroit will continue to fight and win some games in Detroit. Beat LA! Beat LA!

On Sunday, we concluded our 40-Day PDL with a big celebration. That tent that the church rented turned out better than I thought...and thank goodness it didn't rain (it was overcast). Still a little pricy in my books, but I guess it was pretty good... though I couldn't help thinking how cool it'd be if we did an outdoor praise night in that thing, packed it with people, and rocked the neighbourhood. Heheh. The whole procession went ok, I guess, but was quite long. I helped the singspiration team out by playing piano as always. This Saturday, our congregation will be going on a retreat to Camp Galilee... dunno if I'll be going just yet. Hoping to get a planning sesh with my university group planned after the retreat in order to plan out our activities for the rest of the summer. Definitely hoping to bond more with that group.

Here's a point to ponder, something I heard on the last 7:22 worship service I watched. The talk was on Temptations and Louie spoke about how we consistently fail to resist temptations over and over again. He compared temptations to the little jigs used in fishing, where there's always a shiny piece to draw us in and a hidden hook(s) underneath the skin to catch us. I was thinking, man how true is that... we know we're tempted by things, we can see ourselves be tempted, and yet we still fall into the same traps over and over again. Satan's devious and cunning, using every trick in the book. Crazy... scary...

Ah yes, and it's official... my family and I will be taking a trip to Vancouver this summer, in August. Neato, since I've never been to BC and I hear it's really gorgeous there.

Still no job, though it seems the job market has picked up a bit this month... [crossing fingers]