Weekend Update

"Here's the fake news!" ...err ...update.

**Special 4 Day Edition!**

FRIDAY

Brent invited me to play Glowball Golf, but before that we met up at Frudruckers for dinner with Dani, Kim, Jill, and my friend Ryan. When Brent suggested Frudruckers he said "Random, I know." And I was like, random? Not at all! I was excited, come to find out, NONE of our group had eaten there before except for Brent. It is totally my kind of place, the have all different sizes of burgers up to the 1 pounder! Ready for complete customization to your liking. And to top it off they have vats of hot melted cheese ready for dipping.... for FREE!

Anyway, back to Glowball, it was a blast, they turn off all the lights and you're out playing golf with a glowing ball on a completely dark course. It was the most unique golfing experience I've ever had. The crowd was not your average golf crowd, it was definetely an 'after hours' type crowd. It was a 72 player 9-hole shotgun start tournament. We ended up playing 11 holes, and played on one green for about 15 minutes having some sand shot contests. SO much fun, we'll definetely be back next time!

SATURDAY

We went to the Orange Street Fair on Saturday night. It was my third time attending the street fair, I can't believe I've lived here long enough to have attended an annual event 3 times. It was good food and fun as always. I had a veal brat on Switzeland Street, a Carlsberg beer in Denmark, a Souvlaki Beef Gyro on Greek Street, and Ableskivers for dessert in Norway.

SUNDAY

I came home from the street fair to a surprise, my roommate had moved out 15 days earlier than I expected. When I came home all of his stuff was gone, and he was too, with out a trace, with out a note, and with the money that he owed me. Oh well... as Dani said, its the end of the era of roommates! So we spent Sunday cleaning the beach house from top to bottom, now that it will be just me staying there untill Dani moves in after the wedding. We rewarded our cleaning efforts with a delicious meal at our new favorite hole in the wall, Taco Mesa, with Phil and Kirsten, before we hit up night Church at Mariners.


MONDAY

Dani and I made the most of having a whole extra day to spend together, and decided to go for a long paddle on the kayaks. We finally did what we've been talking about doing for months. We kayaked from Dana Point Harbor to Calafia Beach, where I live. About 7.5 miles on the water, and took about 2.5 hours, it was a great paddle, we felt such a sense of accomplishment afterward. It was definetely an exercize in strength building, in all senses of the word, mentally, physically, relationally, and spiritually.

Photography Phriday

Don't you hate when you think you have a good picture and then someone either intentionally or accidentally gets in the background and screws it up??? All I'm saying is, if you're going to do it, do it right. Here's some pros...

CLICK THIS!

Get all the last-minute auction action!

Movie Critiques from real people not cynical critics.

So much for buying the latest and greatest fishing tackle.

Anyone looking for an early Christmas or Mother's Day Present?

Utah's Arches are falling down, falling down, falling down!

Not your average How-To site.

HOLY EXHAUST BATMAN! Only 110 grand for a Batmobile with only 58 miles???

And you though mix-tapes were dead?

Extremely rare! Two-Headed baby in Bangledesh, unfortunately doesn't make it.

YouTube of the Week

Drunk Animals in Africa!

WEEKEND UPDATE

It was another pretty chill weekend for us, in fact I think I'll phone in the update today, since Dani gave a pretty good rundown of it on her blog yesterday.

They only things I might add are that we did go to the beach, and for a swim, even though I had to convince Dani to go in the water, it was so nice.... as always. Also, on Saturday morning, I ran from my house to Dani's house! From San Clemente to Dana Point, it was about 8 miles. It was a great run, but its wierd to me now, 8 miles sounded like a lot when I was only running 3 or 4, but now its like, well if you can run 8 you can run 10 or 12 or 15, I mean its only 1/3 of a marathon!

Photography Phriday

My lovely fiancee's and my engagement photo session, taken in San Clemente by our friend Rick.

Click This!

Can you name the 100 most common English words? GO! (This is fun, I only got 38. Either I have a very small vocabulary, or I only use really big words.)

Ever need to make some quick edits on a photo on some other PC?

Only in Texas.

Want to watch a movie (or TV) from any computer anywhere anytime?


If you thougth gasoline was stinky, try running your car on poop! ( I just love that CNN used poop in an article title. )


Hot deals on shades, accessories, and crap you don't need. One deal at a time.


Looks like the US will prevail in overall medals, but China's taken a commanding lead in Golds.


Ultimate Tic-Tac-Toe!

YouTube of the Week!

WEEKEND UPDATE

This weekend was much more relaxed than usual, since I had to work and be on call for support. But it was still a great weekend. So here's the update:

FRIDAY

My friend Nate Deibler is getting married this weekend, so on Friday we had a bachelor party for him. No drinking, drugs, or stippers, just good fun. We started off the night by getting a delicious meal at Claim Jumper. I had the liver and onions.... mmmmmmm.... so good. I also learned about a new drink, the Rocky Brown. "Iced tea with grenadine and cherries, heavy on the grenadine" says our friend Rocky Brown when the puzzled waitress asks him what a Rocky Brown is. Later she asks, who Rocky Brown is, and he non-chalantly replies, "Oh, he played for USC."

Then we rolled over to Saddleback lanes for some bowling. We bought two lanes for an hour, so in true Nate style, he says, "let's do speed bowling. Bowl as fast as you can for the hour whichever lane has the most total points wins. But if you hit the lane guard that comes down, you loose 20 points." None of us had ever done this before, but were all for it. We didn't have any amazing scores, but it was actually alot of fun to bowl this way, everyone was on their toes so you never had to sit around waiting for someone to realize it is their turn. After bowling we headed over to the Irvine Spectrum for a game of Diminishing Bridge in the spectrum. It was a fun night, just rolling around town with a dozen or so guys was fun, and something that should happen more often.

SATURDAY

I had to miss part two of the bachelor party (5 mile hike to a bridge that goes nowhere to bungee off of) because I had to work this weekend. I worked 52+ hours this week to try and make up for our department being short staffed. So I was a little busy with that this weekend, but it was kind of nice to get to stay at home and watch alot of olympics. I got my fill of all the little aired sports I'd been wanting to see, handball, field hockey, fencing, water polo, equestrian, etc.... instead of continuous and incessant Phelps coverage.

Brent and Kim came down to visit us at the beach for a few hours so it was fun to catch up with them and go swimming in the ocean. They always get sentimental when they come to the beach house, which Brent's dad and uncle owns, and tend to talk about their dreams and stuff. Its great, and actually very inspiring to think about my own dreams.

SUNDAY

More of the same as Saturday, working and olympics. Dani and I still managed a couple hours down at the beach and in the ocean, we just can't stay away. Then I felt the need to go for a "quick jog" but I got into it while I was out and ended up running 5 miles. I can't wait for the next race! Dani and I got a registry started at Bed, Bath, and Beyond. I was getting a little carried away with zapping all the cool gadgets and gizmos and stuff, and Dani said, OK, time to go. She could tell I was registered out. So then we went to the Sunday Night Service at Mariners that was relocated to the Cafe on campus due to a wedding. It was great, I love the vibe of Church in that kind of venue, low key, acoustic type worship. Praying together for the people around you, it is very real and inviting.

So all in all, it was a much needed, very low key, relaxing weekend.

Photography Phriday

Phun with Phacial Hair

Weekend Update

Sorry for the delay, I know you've been waiting for the update. It was yet another completely fun filled weekend, so let's get to it.






FRIDAY

The weekend started early as we had a half day on Friday because DealerSocket, the company I work for (also the best company in the world, really, we won an award naming us that), had our 3rd annual Beach Luau. So we went down to the beach, Dani came with, got to meet all the work peeps. We hung out, grilled, played some football. Good times. Then Dani and I took off as we had a double date with Phirsten (our couple name for Phil and Kirsten). We went to the spectrum to see Dark Knight, finally. It was a great movie. Lots of fun superhero action, but also lots of plot, thinking, crime drama kinda stuff, to keep you interested.


SATURDAY

We got up early for the FUEL Grow Hike. We went out to Whiting Ranch wilderness for a 'moderate' hike. Of course it was claimed to be moderate by Mike Landa, my buddy that runs 100 mile ultra marathons. So it was a decent hike. We read some verses together, prayed, and talked about finding time alone with God. It was cool to get out and hike with some friends.
After being good and athletic for a while we thought we go to The Hat for lunch for some good ol' pastrami dip sandwhiches and a bag full of french fries. Delicious.
Then Dani and I got to spend some time relaxing at my place and nap in the hammock under the sun shade, storing up some energy for our next activity. Last week Dani asked if I could teach her how to play basketball!! That's right she, just out of the blue asked me to take her to play basketball. (Guys, in case you're getting any ideas, you might want to click this.) So I was super excited to, so we scouted out a vacant basketball court in Dana Point. I thought that we could just have some fun playing around, maybe give her a few pointers. But as often happens with Dani, I was pleasantly surprised to see that she was a super quick study, and picked up skills like a champ, and even better, wants to play again!
The evening was spent grilling at our friend Scott's house. Lots of food, fun, and friends. We grilled, ate, drank, swam, jacuzzied, smoked cigars. Good times. One disappointment however, I bought a Heineken mini-keg to share. But it sucked! Has anyone used one of these before? All it did was spew out foamy beer. OK, two disappointments. At the end of the night we discovered that Scott had one of those little Fischer Price picnic tables. I thought it'd be fun to try and sit in it. It wasn't that fun, for me, for everyone, lots of fun. I was stuck, but did anyone try and help me out? No. They all stood around laughing pointing and saying, "NO don't move, I'll go get my camera!"


SUNDAY

Dani and I finally went kayaking in Newport Harbor! We've been wanting to do that for a while now. And it was all we hoped for. The harbor is even bigger than we thought, once you're in the water. We paddled for over 3 hours and about 7 miles, and still didn't even see half of it. My favorite part though was the fish! There were fish (Yellowfin Croaker, I think) LEAPING out of the water, sometimes as high as 3-4 feet! And they were everywhere, so I'm definetely bringing my pole next time.

We saw these huge seals jumping up on the boats that were moored in the middle of the harbor, and they would play king of the mountain pushing each other off the boat and barking when victorious.

(One for the One Armed Album!)

Photography Phriday

Last summer, we went out to eat with my family while my mom and sister were in town. I love oysters, and I love hot sauce. So there I was eating these oysters and select a random hot sauce of the shelf of dozens of hot sauces to choose from. I chose Dave's Insanity Sauce. Which measures 180,000 on the scoville scale (didn't know that at the time). Anyway, I just piled up a heathly dollop of insanity sauce on my oyster, and my sister had the presence of mind to take pictures.

Click This!

Remember the card game Speed? Here's a fun online version.

This could definetely encourage me to wake up.

Shop and Save by sharing hot deals.

When flowers hurt... why don't we do this at the Rose Parade?!?!

Will China keep it from raining tomorrow???

Yet another reason why the Ruskies are hard core.

You thought that one lane back road you take home was scary? Check these roads out.

Hollywood, by The Numbers.

YouTube of the Week: TRACTOR FIGHT!

(gotta love Bollywood)

WEEKEND UPDATE

This weekend was an amazing weekend that reminded me why I love "Livin' Out West!" It was busy (so forgive the length of the post), but it was so relaxing and free. So, here's the update.

FRIDAY

Dani and I got out of work as early as we could, and booked it to the Doheny State Beach (pictured) in Dana Point for a quick surf session. The waves were great, the water was 70 degrees, and it was just nice to be out in the ocean with my fiance. So we played in the waves for a bit, then had to bail to go get ready for dinner. We had D46 with Fuel on Friday night, where we all sign up and get placed into groups of six and have dinner at different restaurants. We were placed in a group at Buca di Beppo. It was good company and a delicous meal served family style. Then we met up with all the other tables at The District for desert.

SATURDAY

I got up bright and early for another surf session, I'm beginning to see why this sport is addicting. It was my friend Mike's birthday, and he's just getting into surfing as well. Dani was having breakfast with friends, so Mike, Kara, and I rode bikes from my house down to San Onofre State Beach. I towed 3 surfboards behind my bike, it was a good workout, and definetely good traithlon training. It felt so good to hit the water after the ride. And once we paddled through the waves the sun came out and it was so beautiful and peaceful out there. Just kinda makes everything else fade away and you're just alone with yourself and God. Even if there is some overweight hairy surfer floating by you, there's still just something freeing about being out there.

We had to keep it short however, because it was on to the next adventure for me. Dani and I decided to cash in her birthday present for me, whale watching gift certificates! We had heard that the blue whales (100 ft/100 tons) were here feeding right now, and stood a good chance of seeing them, but no luck on the whales. We did however see a TON of dolphin. They were so much fun, swimming and jumping all around the boat. Once again, being out on the water was very freeing from the cares and concerns of the world, and all that mattered was enjoying the beauty of the ocean with my fiance.

Here's some video I took of the dolphins jumping just in front of the catamaran, the video doesn't do it justice, but it gives you an idea.

Saturday night, Dani and I checked out the Saturday night service at Mariner's. It was cool! A much smaller crowd, but still a great service. Then we went home and watched Batman Begins, I had never seen it, and loved it, so now I'm ready for Dark Night!

SUNDAY

We got up early again and went up to Newport to kayak in the back bay with Dani's Maid of Honor, Donna. It was very peaceful and quiet in the back bay. And fish were jumping all over the place! We'll definetely have to go back there with a rod.

Dani had plans with friends the rest of the day, and I spent the rest of the afternoon around the house, it was nice to get some stuff done, but it was nicer to lay in the new hammock, under the sun shade, in the 70 degree breeze, drink a Heineken, read a book, and love life. I didn't plan on going down to the beach, as I already felt like the weekend was too good to be true, but I got online to check the conditions anyway. When I saw the water was 74 degrees, I couldn't resist running down for a swim. I planned on just dipping in for about 20 minutes, but conditions were so perfect, I couldn't bring myself to get out and stayed in the water for 2 hours! The waves were just the right size, for the best body surfing I've ever experienced! I wouldn't have thought it possible, but it was yet another wonderfully freeing experience.

Then to top it all off, we had a core leadership team meeting at our pastor's house. And what did Justin want to talk about all night? Freedom. What makes you feel free, and what freedom are you fighting for? It was an appropriate and fitting end to an amazing weekend.

Photography Phriday

Mosaic Mosaic

After all the buzz the mosaic post from last Friday generated, I thought I would make a mosaic of my family's mosaics. Here we have mine, Dani's, Ashley's, Aunt Linda's, Brent's, Kim's, and two from Mom. Mom couldn't decide on the pictures, so she had to do two. I know, wierd, she's normally so decisive!

(Click on the pic for a big view)

Click This!

Ever wonder what the oldest joke in the book really is?

Is this a Flock of Birds or School of Fish?

10 Astonishing Landscapes

Want to search 121,617,892,992 web pages? Cuil. (Cool)

If anyone is looking to shop for early an Christmas present for me...

Why wait till you're in a crisis? Some of these Mid-Life Crisis saving trips sound pretty awesome right now!

18 kids in 23 years. WOW.

AND without further ado..... YouTube of The Week!

WEEKEND UPDATE

FRIDAY

Friday night, Dani and I got to take some more engagement pictures. Just our style too, it wasn't all posed and staged in a studio. It was just us on the beach playing around and having fun, we were lucky enough to have our friend Rick take the pics, and Maid of Honor, Donna to hold all of our stuff. Will definetely post pics asap. Then we took Rick out to Sonny's Pizza and Pasta for his inaugural Sonny's experience, and we were all more than satisfied with our post-pic session meals.

SATURDAY

Dani and I joined a few close friends and about 15 thousand of our fellow OCers at the US Open of Surfing in Huntington Beach. It was a beautiful day with warm water and pretty nice waves, a great day to sit on the beach in my new Costco Beach Chair and watch surfing and hoopla.

SUNDAY

5:30am Sunday, Dani, Seth, Mike, and I drove up to Big Bear Lake for the California Multisport Triathlon. It was a 6 mile trail run, 15 mile mountain bike ride, and a 5 mile lake paddle. We decided to go relay style instead of solo, and were able to come in with an overall time of 4:36:20. It was alot of fun, and a beautiful day up in the mountains (which made Dani and really want to go camping). Here's some pics that our wonderful support staff snapped:

We all resolved to get serious about training and go it solo next year!

Photography Phriday

This is fun, you should try it.

Here's how you do it-
a. type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr search.
b. using only the first page, pick an image
c. copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd's mosaic maker.

The questions-
1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. What is your favorite drink?
7. Dream Vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What do you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One Word to describe you?
12. Favorite Animal?

Click This!

If you thought baby names Apple and Pilot Inspektor were bad, what about Number 16 Bus Shelter or Violence?

Great idea, in case you ever forget your spoon, or don't want to pack one.

Don't like people touching your feet? Let fish do it!

Someone's been taking terminator tips from Arnold.

Here's some great pics of the architecture Bejing has created for the Olympic Games.

Guys, are you tired of jingling bulky pockets? Condense!

NEW ADDITION TO CLICK THIS! - FAVORITE YOU TUBE OF THE WEEK!

This is a true story. I recommend muting the music, it makes it a little cheesy.

Word.

We wrapped up our study of Acts in small group last night, covering the last two chapters. These were a great couple chapters about Paul weathering a storm and getting shipwrecked and finally making it to Rome. It is a bit of an anticlimactic end to the great story of Acts, as it concludes with Paul proclaiming the kingdom of God "with all boldness and without hindrance!" But then again, I'm not sure how else I would have it end. It gives hope of things to come.

I asked the group what lesson or application they pulled out of the last two chapters and it was interesting because everyone had a different answer. The thing that I learned was that God will allow for things to happen and cause situations to occur in order to conform to his plan. As Paul later writes in Ephesians 1:11-12:

11 In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of
him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, 12 in
order that we, who were the first to put our hope in Christ, might be for the
praise of his glory.

God had a plan that he had revealed to Paul for him go to Rome to teach of Jesus and proclaim the gospel. Paul gets there but takes a most unlikely route. He is taken prisoner, has to appeal to Caesar in order to avoid getting tried by the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem. He is placed on a grain boat with other prisoners set to sail during the winter when it was not safe to sail. They go through a storm so intense that all the men on board lose hope of surviving and go without food for 14 days. They shipwreck on the island of Malta, the guards normally would kill the prisoners to keep them from escaping in the event of shipwreck, but they spare their lives. They winter on Malta where the islanders take unusually good care of them. Next spring, they board a new boat that finally takes them to Rome. An unbelievably circuitous route that only God could make happen in order to fulfill his plan of Paul going to the metropolis of Rome to tell about Jesus.

WEEKEND UPDATE

FRIDAY

Dani and I went to the movies, decided not to fight with the Dark Night crowds and save that for later. We debeated long and hard over whether to see Hancock or WallE. Well turns out the movie times decided for us after all and we saw WallE. It was pretty good, probably the least talking I've ever seen in a movie, save Disney's Fantasia. But it was impressive to see a story told with so few words. The graphics were also very impressive, they were the most real animated robots with feelings I've ever seen.

SATURDAY


FUEL had our 2nd Annual Beach Decathlon in Huntington, good times were had by all, and rope burns as well. We competed in events such as tug of war, lifegaurd races, and buried treasure. But perhaps the most fun was the all out water balloon war at the end. No rules just peg people as hard as you can with water balloons. Later, Dani and I started putting our registry together. I was very confused and overwhelmed by this whole process. But Dani was very sure of what needed to happen so that's probably good. Because if it were up to me we might just end up with a bunch of gadgets and tools and stuff, and not be able to cook any food or have anywhere to sit.



SUNDAY


Dani and I got to go Kayaking first thing on Sunday morning, it was so peaceful and tranquil, we loved it. Then we spent the rest of the day at the San Clemente Ocean Festival. This was great fun, and it wasn't too uncomforably overcrowded. But they had games, races, sand sculpture contests, art, and old woodie cars on the pier. It was great eye candy, and I mean good eye candy, not the bad-rot-your-eyes kind of eye candy. I'll post some of my pics later.

Sunday night we went to chuch at Rock Harbor at the Shark Club, for the LAST TIME! We were sad to find out that last night was the last time they would be having a night service at the Shark Club that Dani and I were fond of attending because of the intimate envoirnment, great worship, and a personable pastor. But its kind of exciting at the same time, because now we have other oppurtunities to explore.