*Today’s blog is in response to meagansmith.wordpress.com’s definition of my mind as a Wiki-Trail seeker (i sure love her a lot!)

I love information.  Useless trivia (I tend to bug meagan with my pop up trivia version of movies, music, books, and other things.  I know she loves me though cause she puts up with it..  Riddles.  Jokes.  Books.  News.  Stories.  Anything that I can hold on to and recount.  I collect information the way others might collect keepsakes, souvenirs, or ticket stubs.  Information that I recall can take me back to where I read that or heard that.  Like a keepsake I am reminded of my feelings at the time, or as a souvenir of another time.  The thought itself is a ticket stub of where I have been, what I have “witnessed,” and what I lay claim to as a piece of information.

I acquire information, stories, and data and then store them away. Why are they worth storing? At the time of storing (or filing it in my brain boxes…with my mind grapes!) it is often hard to say exactly when or why I might need them, but I also realize that I never know when it might become useful? With a beautiful collection of possibility engendering “facts” in mind, I  don’t feel comfortable throwing anything away (I see this connection in life to, I am a bit of a pack rat and I am trying to fight this!). But I will continue to acquire and compile and file stuff away. It’s interesting. It keeps my mind fresh. And perhaps, hopefully, and most likely (I have discovered), some of it will prove valuable one day.

I like to take that information and then converse with others who have so many diverse and enlightening opinions.  I love to sit with an individual (especially my Dove…she is so smart!) or group and talk about life, love, philosophy, and even (with humbled reverence for the mysteries I will never know) God.  Even if the conversation never goes anywhere, it is the exchange of ideas and information that makes me light up like a New Orleans evening during Mardi Gras.

I am fascinated and deeply intrigued by ideas. What is an idea? An idea is, to put it simply, a concept, the best explanation of the most events. I get so excited when I can discern beneath the complex surface of an issue and find a beautifully simple concept (or pattern) to explain why things are the way they are. An idea then forms a connection for me. My mind  is always looking for connections and I am greatly enamored when seemingly disparate occurrences can be linked by some seemingly irrelevant connection. The ideas can even become a fresh perspective on familiar challenges for me – whether professionally or personally. I want to take the world we all know and turn it this way and that so we as a community can view it from a strange but enlightening angle. Simply put, ideas are thrilling, and for me that is enough sometimes!

I don’t know what kind of intellectual pursuits you find intriguing but I hope you find ways to challenge yourself personally.  Whether I am just sitting vegging out on video games or I am in deep study for a bible lesson, I know that I will always continue to think and examine things from different angles.  Maybe that is why I feel a close connection with post-modernity because I want to find all the angles people look at the world from and then discern connections between them so we can live in harmony and understanding.

*I would like to add one disclaimer.  I do love wikipedia.org, but YES I am aware of the evils of open source information sharing and so it is usually a springboard for me to go different places and look to real sources for info!

*If you are a news junkie I recommend www.drudgreport.com for intense, diverse, constantly updated news stories.

Hope you are having a great day.  peace to you

current itunes track: Pardon Me, Incubus, Make Yourself

currently watching: not much. I am behind on tv stuff, been pretty busy!

currently gaming: new tunes on rock band 2.  i am disappointed in the content put out by GH: world tour, rock band 2 is light years ahead!

currently reading: Living Your Strengths, Winseman, Clifton, and Liesveld, Gallup Press 2003

So I haven’t blogged since the start of December and I apolgize.  I have been lazy, and apparently that kills so i better watch out!

Lots of changes.  Life is good, I saw Katie and Daniel get married (which means I also got to see some other great friends!  What a great weekend), Christmas was off the chain (I got spoiled like crazy.  RIDICULOUSLY CRAZY.  IT was awesome to see family.), the new year has started well (see below), and now today I am sick as a dog andtrying not to cough up a lung!

The New Year has started and Meagan and I are participating with the Fam in a Biggest Loser type contest.  It is pretty awesome.  The winner will get a new article of clothing from everyone else who participates!  So far I have lost around 10 or so pounds in a week and a half…i need to work harder!

Like always I have been missing friends like crazy.  This college student to adult transition is just no fun, I am glad that Difab, Kyzer, and Selena are here…we are hoping to go to houston before Spring Break though!

Meagan and I have bought some more furniture.  We got her a cool Baker’s rack at hobby lobby and then we got an end table and coffee table for the living room.  We even got some art for the bedroom so meagan is helping me be all domestic since my idea of good pictures are posters!

Surprise on Tuesday, I went to Game Stop and found a copy of Assassin’s Creed for $17.99, this is the 7th best rated XBOX360 game and I snagged it for under twenty bucks, so much for workingout this week!  HA!

New office on TONIGHT!  Don’t miss it.

So I should wrap this up.  Sorry there isn’t any real content, I will get back to regular blogging with all sorts of jokes soon!  You rock.

peace to you and your family

currently on itunes: Genius playlist starting with Everything’s Magic, Angels and Airwaves

currently watching: 80s movies, classic action movies

currently reading: Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk (for the umpteenth time)

currently gaming: Assassin’s Creed, XBOX360 – Sid Meier’s Priates, PSP – Heavy Weapon XBOX360 Arcade

currently wishing: to just travel around the country and play music.  Schedule Leo Goes Grr in your hometown (just leave me a comment and we will work out the details!  Come on Lubbock, Phoenix, Houston, Tulsa, New Jersey, and Canada…you know you want this tour!)

This week has been busy.  Planning, working, living, laughing, and enjoying!  Meagan and I celebrated our 6 year anniversary yesterday (from the day I asked her out. hahaha).  So we celebrated the best way we know how, by being at church and having a great communion service with the students.  man i love being a pastor.

Heroes and the Office return this week.  WOW.  Never have I been glued to the tv like this, o except every video game I have ever played. (i am sure mom is laughing.  i know you miss the sound of sirens and gun shots from the game room haha!).  I am excited for the office.  o man i have been watching youtube clips in my office OVER AND OVER.  If you did not see the slap face commercial during the olympics.  then stop.  STOP right now.  type youtube into your browser address and look up the office slap face.  one of the greatest 31 seconds you will ever spend.  i promise.

My friend Jessica and I have been planning a new mid-week service for prayer and worship aimed at college students and 20 somethings.  Well really it is aimed as a place for people to come and drop FACEDOWN before God and worship and pray for an hour.  I don’t really care who shows up…I am just pumped that we can all worship TOGETHER!  So if you are in the Oklahoma City area on October 7th at 9pm you should come to Northview Community Church for the first FACEDOWN.  Seriously it will rock.

I have been reading like a maniac.  Meagan and I are on different schedules.  Mainly she gets up at 5:15 ever morning and I DON’T.  So what does this mean for me when Meagan declares bed time at 10 ?  Well it means for me that I have been reading, anything I can get my hands on until about 3 in the morning because I don’t have to get my day going until 8:30.  So I have been reading.  Fiction, non-fiction, magazines, classic novels, theology books.  You name it I am ingesting it (well not like really ingesting it and don’t name drugs cause…thats just bad).  Anyway I feel like the bookworm I was in high school again and it is grand.  I LOVE reading.

Well I better go.  I have to get ready for our small group and then we are going to PARTY and watch the office premier!  AWESOME.

peace to you

current itunes track: Inside Out, Eve 6, Eve 6

currently reading: Simply Christian, N.T. Wright (just finished Fahrenheit 451.  such a great novel)

currently watching:  the office clips on hulu.com

currently gaming:  i am going to rent rock band 2. sounds awesome.