mike utech dot com

Originally posted October 17th, 2006

Has anyone ever seen Rob Bell from Mars Hill Bible Church/Nooma and Chester Bennington from Linkin Park at the same time? I think they may be the same person, how cool would that be!

On Saturday, Zoe was invited to a birthday party of one of her classmates, a skating party at an area skating rink. As a kid I got to go to the local skating rink every chance my aunt got to take us. She was a skating fiend, had custom skates, the skating outfit - yes, this was the 80s let your imagination take you back… kinda scary flash back wasn’t it. Anyway, my aunt was the bomb when it came to skating, she could do all the cool moves and could even do them all backwards. Myself, I spent a lot of time skating on the carpet, that extra resistance kept the speed down a bit, gave just a little bit more grip than the smooth skating floor, and it was a little more forgiving when you fell on it.
Anyway, some 20 years later I found myself in the skating rink, and they are playing the same music they did when I was there some 20 years ago (ok, so it was more like fifteen to eighteen years ago). I opted not to get a pair of skates and join in the fun, I did help Zoe get her “legs” and we played two rounds of air hockey - I need to get one of those for home. She only feel down like 2 or 3 times, only one of those times was a hard fall and I was there to comfort her. She was able to skate around the rink one time without touching the wall and without falling, granted it wasn’t fast but she did it. All in all she had a great time. The two and a half hours of party time were wrapped up with a “couples” skate to the magical sound of Steven Perry singing of his faithfulness.

What ever happened to the “Just Say No” campaign and the “war” on drugs. Remember the dude with the frying pan and the egg, I still remember that commercial like it was just on TV.

I have never experimented/used any Schedule I or II drugs, typically the drugs that are tested for in a drug test, with the exception of alcohol. So when I have had to take a pre-employment drug test I have never had to give it a second thought. Well I guess I did think back to the last poppyseed muffin/cake that I had (especially after I saw that episode of MythBusters). But you go pee in a cup and that is that, no big deal.

I was in GNC the other day picking up some Melatonin and over-heard the clerk helping another customer. He was looking for a detox product because he had to take a drug test to get a job, he had used product X before but couldn’t find it. The clerk explained that all the detox products were pretty much the same thing they just but the ones that they can get at the best price, which I think is a considerable margin below the $34.99-49.99 that they sell them for. The guy stated that it had been a couple of weeks but he wanted to make sure that it was out of his system.

I have a suggestion, but I kept my mouth shout while there, if you are concerned about having to take a drug test don’t use illegal drugs. That doesn’t really seem all that hard. Pretty much if you are in an industry (i.e. factory, heavy machinery, contract jobs, etc.) that requires pre-employment drug testing they leave the crap alone. I guess this is a world that I have never been a part of, and I am thankful for that.

If they start testing for Diet Coke, Chipotle or Ice Cream - I am so screwed!

Wiki links… Just Say No War on Drugs

Repost of lost October 23rd, 2006 entry…

Main Entry: de·fine Inflected Form(s): de·fined; de·fin·ing 1 a : to determine or identify the essential qualities or meaning of
Source: Merriam-Websters Online

Still thinking about some of Tom’s sermon from this morning. Tom was telling about a high school student that attends the school we meet at and whose family is a part of the community. She was in an innocent collision accident during gym or practice and after colliding feel to the ground and injured her spinal cord, she has been very active in soccer and has played as much as possible, due to her injury she was told that she will not be able to play for 365 days. Upon getting this news one of the things that her mother told her was that “[she] is not defined by soccer”.

I just finished reading “for one more day” this evening. Which really goes along with this theme that Tom stated again today, “You are not defined by what you do.”
I have reached that age where I am fully an adult, no turning back now - I can feel it now, the body doesn’t have the same spring, I am doing older people things - heck, I am starting to feel when the weather is changing, yikes! I have had success and failures, and for some reason the failures always seem to be the closest to the front of your mind, maybe that is why people die - so we can gather around and share those stories of the successes… more on that in a second.
I am not defined by what I do. I am not defined by the mistakes I have made in my past. I am not defined by my parents divorce. I am not defined by the job I lost. I am not defined by the extra weight I carry. I am not defined by the hardships or tragedy in my life. We are not meant to be defined by the things that we do… think about that for a second, pretend you just met yourself and you have to introduce yourself but you are not allowed to say anything you do. Who are you really? A couple of years ago the church we were at did a series or maybe just a sermon called “Just Be!”. Have you ever walked up to an apple tree expecting to find an orange, or a peach tree to get a fig, of course not… does an apple tree have to toil to make an apple, no - it makes an apple because that is what apple trees do.
So what does define me?
I am defined by what I reproduce and what I create, the lives that I touch. Most importantly I am defined by four little people, who they become as a result of me, the impact that I leave on their lives - the stories that they tell someday when I am gone. The change that I make in my world. That is what defines me.

Are you familiar with the term, Jumping the Shark? Simply, the point at which you have passed your peak. A number of years ago I was turned on to the band Third Day, a contemporary christian band that had a rock n’ roll feel. While I have abandoned most “christian” music with the exception of worship music, I think it is safe to say that Third Day has officially jumped the shark, or in this case the manger.

I guess looking back on the releases of Thrid Day one can probably make a good case that the shark was already jumped with the release of Offerings II, I mean come on - you release a worship album which really takes off and is a successful album, so then you put out another one with another set of songs - just like the sequal movie franchise. Thrid Day has released an album or two since the worship pair but they just didn’t catch on like “Come Together” did. So now as the Christmas Season is once again started earilier, Third Day has just release “Offerings III” a collection of christmas songs. For starters, no one releases a christmas album in their prime, christmas albums are released while you are on the way out and you are making every effort to hang on to that success that you once had, not to mention artists have bills to pay just like you and me. So I don’t fault Third Day for releasing a Christmas album, I just want to point out the obvious. The Manager has been jumped.