blame it all upon my rosary

- Miriam and I went into NYC last night to take advantage of free train week for students and to see a favorite band of ours, Basement Band. B-ri got me into them during my first summer at camp and I've subsequently got Miriam into them. I saw them in Albany back in December or January and was quite stoked to see them again; they did not disappoint. A little flustered by the sound guy telling them they needed to start out right after setting up because they needed to be off within in 35 minutes the show started a little slow but built in huge momentum. They covered a Dylan song and rocked it. They also played a number of my favorites of theirs including "Charleston" which has some of the most amazing harmonies I've ever heard; with that song they completely sold the crowd who was filled with some of their bands and some to see bands playing later in the night. They end the night with a Fleetwood Mac cover (The Chain) in which Amal, their female vocalist was a dead ringer for Stevie Nicks. It was such a great show and tough work I imagine selling yourself to an audience in NYC but they did excellently. We are excited to see them again sometime soon. If I was a record exec, I'd sign them...NOW!
- Just finished up the first week of classes and it looks like it will be a good semester. I'm only taking 3 classes compared to the normal 4 to 5 because of the curriculum shift here and it should be great. I should be able to give more attention to each class than previously before. One of the classes involved creative writing which excites me, haven't done too much creative writing here outside of sermon prep.
- Youth group has begun to start up at Westfield which I am really excited about. I also started my other internship there working at their soup kitchen in Elizabeth. It is raw. I'll be posting more about it I am sure. But if you need any proof to refute Republicans who say the economy is not bad shape come along and you'll see they're lying. It is good work they do there and very much different from any soup kitchen I've been to before.

thunderstruck

It's thundering big time here right now, it's awesome. I love thunderstorms and the sounds of pouring rain. We hadn't gotten rain in a few weeks and we had an all day pour-fest here on Saturday and now it's at it again. Good for the earth I suppose. I learned to appreciate rain two summers ago when the first week of camp it rained and rained and the lake rose nearly 3 feet. That was crazy.
I was listening to NPR on my way back from the market this morning and they were interviewing a guy who is working for a company working to bring inexpensive high speed internet to third world countries. Now my first thought was "really, do they need high speed internet there, what about food, medicine, and clean drinking water first?" But then he acknowledged that high speed internet was not the answer to all problems but these countries also needed better communication tools overall and better means of transport, not one mention of food, medicine, and clean drinking water. Now I don't deny that third world countries need better means of transport and better communication tools but high speed internet... really? I can just picture it now, a small village in the Congo where people still live in fear of militia attacks and constantly deal with dysentery because of unclean drinking water and AIDs in still unchecked, but hey, at least they can watch YouTube and surf for porn, now how's that for progress?!
School starts up again in less than a week. Can't decide if I am excited or not. I will keep you updated.

while you be makin it rain, i be makin it snow

It's been a little while since I've written so lots to tell:
- I finished Greek last Friday. It felt good to be done and felt good not having stressed a lot over it all summer.
- Miriam's parents have been in town since last Friday which has been great. My parents came down for Saturday afternoon and Sunday which was also really good. The pics are from our hike on Monday. We hiked Bearfort Ridge in northern Jersey which I'd been to once before and has to be my favorite place in NJ. You can see the NYC skyline a few times during the hike (which none of the guidebooks mention which we think is a way to keep people from flocking to the trail like crazy). We also saw a black bear during the hike which is cool in a scary/exciting way especially since it was a cub and the mama bear was no where to be seen so we freaked a bit thinking we were in between the two (never a good idea). A little retreat down the trail and some noise making scared the bear off and we finished the rest of the hike with our nerves a little on edge. We also saw a 3 foot long snake, some salamanders, and crossed the NY/NJ border on the AT. Quite an interesting hike to see a bear and the NYC skyline, perfect example of the craziness of NJ.
- Had to run home yesterday for a meeting with my classis (the group that ordains me). They tested me on some things and I passed, one step closer to being ordained!
- While driving through Schenectady yesterday I saw someone with a bumper sticker that read "Say NO to FOIS GRAS: Ban force feeding." It also had a picture of a goose or duck being force feed. For some reason this bumper sticker really pissed me off, not about the force feeding of geese/ducks but about the fact that this was this particular person's "cause" of choice. I couldn't help but think, really, this is what you are angry and protesting about? Some delicacy that less than a tenth of a percent of the world's population could probably afford to eat, let alone have any interest in? What about something that affected a few more people, perhaps people going hungry right in Schenectady or the War in Iraq? But no, you chose to be pissed off about Fois Gras. I know I shouldn't judge lest I be judged but this really pissed me off for some reason.