CSI or Blog? Blog wins.

So I'm back. I've been pretty busy over the past week. Working, class, gym, Jen, family, etc. It gives me so much to look forward to each day. Work has been really really good. We've had some really busy days, but overall it's been pretty chill. My pre-cal class is going really well and Jen has been a huge help with that. I did my homework over her house and she acted as my tutor. I'm thankful she loves math so much. Otherwise I might be out of luck. Surveying on the other hand...not so cool. I'm trying really hard to fight those feelings of disappointment after my first week. I was only there for a little over an hour, but it was a very difficult hour and 15 minutes. It doesn't help that he e-mailed us this morning telling us what we needed to bring for class tomorrow. So I felt like I was making headway on feeling better about that class and he had to go and kill it for me. Pretty much, I should just suck it up and get over it and go to class. Not like not going is an option, but I'm not really looking forward to it. I'm going to move on to the other things that are good. The gym has been going awesome. I ran 3 miles last night in under 31:30 (31:22 to be exact). I was really pumped about that. Jen and I have been working really hard and I feel like I'm really making progress. I've lost 18 lbs. to date and I'll weigh myself again on Friday so we'll see what I'm at for this week. It's my sister's birthday and I'm pretty bummed I didn't get to celebrate it with her and there's no shot this weekend because of the women's retreat (my mom, sister, and Jen are all going together). I guess a phone call will have to suffice for birthday wishes. I do hope they all have a great time at the retreat though. I know everyone is looking forward to it. Still working on that promotion at work. We're starting to go over some things as far as making schedules/ordering/job description. Just little steps each day. I'm really really siked for that. I'm praying each day that God will guide me in what I'm supposed to be doing and how I'm to handle the situations that seem to come up every day. Please continue praying for me also. Well, that about sums everything up for now. Hope everyone is doing well (the 3 that read this anyway), and I'll try and do better at keeping everyone up to date.

Long Day

Well, it turns out Monday was not a gym day. I actually went to Chuch Watson's Realife small group. Chuck was my Breakaway (now they are called Realife groups) leader in high school and he asked me to come and talk to his guys about the group I was in and also give my testimony. I was really really excited at the opportunity to talk so guys who are entering that time in their life where I started making some poor choices. I wanted to let them know that it's o.k. to be open with other guys because they are the ones who keep you accountable. I wasn't very good at that in high school and payed for it dearly. Now in my case, God game me an awesome job and guys who on a daily basis lift me up. Despite all my shortcomings in life, God has blessed me with so many awesome things. I wanted these guys to know that my story was not "cool" or "awesome" because that wasn't the point. The point is I made some very very large mistakes and God STILL used me. To this day it's hard to understand, but it's not really up to me to understand. All I need to know is God loves me despite my imperfections. Really hard to grasp some days, but it's true. Anyway, the guys responded well and had alot of questions afterwards. It felt really good to bond with a couple of them and I look forward to future meetings. So, the gym. I went on Tuesday with my gym partner/motivator (Jen, the marathoner). I ran 3 miles in under 32 minutes, so I was pretty happy with that. Not the best, but I'm getting there. Today, I was looking more for a cardio workout, so I went 4.5 miles in 50 minutes. Slow but steady. I was trying to keep my heartrate around 135. On top of all that I had my first class tonight for Pre-Cal. My prof. is about 70 years old and he was on the team that designed and built 295 that runs from Trenton to the Delaware Memorial Bridge. He seems like a pretty awesome guy so I'm looking forward to this one. Tomorrow night is surverying. We'll see how that one goes. I'm beat and I've got work tomorrow so that about concludes things. Hope everyone is doing well.

A Bit of a Weight Issue

I've decided to keep everyone up to date on my weight loss. Yes, I'm kind of throwing myself out there a little bit in divulging information such as my weight but I figured this: Who really reads this anyway? So, I started at 258 lbs. on December 31st and am currently at 244.5 lbs. as of January 19th. I'll try to put weekly updates on here as far as how I'm doing and whatnot. I ran 2.55 miles today in 27 minutes so my goal for Monday is 2.75 miles in 29 minutes. We'll see if that's doable or not. Stay tuned.

New Class(es)

I signed up for my classes today at BCC. Big news there huh? Actually, it is for me. Every time I go there I have to pray as I'm walking up to the doors because I honestly want to turn around and leave. I don't know if anyone else suffers from this anxiety when it comes to education but it seems to be one of my few issues. I don't know where it comes from but it's there. I've never really liked school but every year after 5th grade it became harder and harder for me to pay attention in school because of my dislike for it. I loved the social aspect of it though. Friends, sports, outside activities, etc. I can't figure out why I didn't like the class part though. I guess due to my biggest fear, failure, I've convinced myself I don't want to risk it. Rather than try and fail, I just didn't even want to try. It's funny though because when it came to baseball, where failure was so prevalent, I didn't hesitate. I wanted to ball when it came to those situations. I guess through it all I found some strong points. I love working with people. Yes, I get frustrated sometimes, but above all else, it's what I love to do. I guess that's why I'm in a servant position at church. Being behind the scenes and helping that many people is really where I feel my best. God has given me such an awesome job and He's surrounded me with such great friends and mentors. I know this was completely roundabout as far as bouncing from one subject to another, but bear with me because this is my thought process sometimes. On top of that, I'm tired. Late nights bowling will do that. Shoutout to Marsh for coming out last night with Rob and I until 1 a.m. and going to work at 5:30. I could never do it. For now, make sure you keep praying for Nathan, Tricia, and Gwyneth Rose in the below mentioned link. Check out their story. It's an amazing one.

Confessions of a CF Husband

Oh, one more thing. I'm sure lots of people have already seen this, but I wanted to make mention of a man who totally encompasses the husband I would love to be someday. Someone who loves God so much and loves his wife and daughter that much. Every day I read this it furthers my belief that our God is a loving God and wants us to be the loving creatures He created us to be. Stay strong Nathan.

http://cfhusband.blogspot.com/

What would you do with 210 million dollars?

I was sitting in the office today with Scott and we started talking about whether FAC (our current employer Fellowship Alliance Chapel) would accept a donation if it came from winning the lottery. Now, this decision will never have to be made in my case because I don't think God would want to entrust me with 210 million dollars. If he did I might get ridiculous and spend it on something stupid like a new Ferrari 430 Scuderia. But, in our dream world, here's what we came up with. I would pay off my debt, anything owed to my parents or by my parents to anyone else. Hopefully both parents could be retired then ;) I'd cut checks to my sister and brother to use as they see fit. I would find some different ways to donate to families in need. I'd get married. I'd have my own house built (I'd want to be part of the project) that would be big enough for me, my future wife, and kids. A 3 car garage with two "normal" cars, and one "fun" car (see above mentioned Ferrari). The biggest thing I could think of though was tithing. 10% seems like such a small number, so we all talked about giving more. I'm not saying all this to make us sound good because we all pretty much said the same exact thing as the next guy. The issue of pride did come up though. Even if you did do all that anonymously, there's still a sense of pride there. It's like "Look at what I did." That would be so hard to avoid. I was wondering what other people would do. How would they handle being thrust on to such a big stage. I wouldn't want that life though. I'm so happy with the life I have now. I love what God has entrusted me with thus far in my life. He's given me so much more than I could have imagined. But again, the question begs. How do you get out of the way of yourself and not be prideful when it comes to giving? I know there's no real answer to that, but that's kind of how we left things this afternoon. Haha, bunch of maintenance men sitting around in an office talking about winning the lottery. Seriously, we do work at FAC. Sometimes.


Oh yeah, Scott wanted a plane and a helicopter instead of cars. He's the aviator amongst us. That's why he's boss. He's different.