Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving at our house. Since Cara's family is in Africa and mine are in St. Louis (and Greg & Mandy are with her folks) we invited other people who where lacking family or plans to come and celebrate with us. Here's who joined us:

• Terry, Teresa, and Lucas
• Josh Schneider
• David Hasenberg
• Eric and Keesha Phiefer
• Laura Beth
• Cara, Jeffry and Leesha

Leesha was supposed to be picked up by her dad but he never showed up. She seemed ok with that. He, later, had a lame excuse. Lucas Treleven was the center of attention and entertained us most of the evening.
It was a great time with lots of great food and lots of great folks.

Chickens, Anu and Anime

Cara and I raked up all the leaves, piled them onto a giant tarp and dragged them down to a pit down at the end of the road. As we dragged the tarp, we approaced the neighbor's driveway. These people have chickens. And these chickens have little fear of strangers or giant tarps. We had to be careful because it was very easy to just drag this thing right on over them. I guess they think food when they see people. Not that they eat people, its that people are who provide their food. Chickens are strange.

We poked around the construction just west of our house, down the hill. Its coming along pretty fast. But the chickens followed us to the construction. Strange animals.

Cara had a night out with her friend Anu. They went shopping and out to dinner. I was thinking of going to a movie by myself, but opted to geek out on Gundam videos instead. It was just what I needed.

Festive Evening

Craig and Tracy and the boys are going back to Africa in about a week. So in celebration and spending some time with them before they go, Delane's and Ron are hosting dinner at their house for the evening. Always a good time at their house.

I had to leave early, because I was invited to Vineeta's house for a Morning Show social gathering. Vineeta has just been switched over to the Morning Show (just after I was, also) and to get to know everyone better she and her husband are hosting this party.

Besides the Christmas Party and hanging out with some of the production crew, this was the first time I ever socialized with KSTP people outside of work and it was a blast!

Seth and his woman were there. I spent a great deal of time talking with Tommy from tapes, hanging out with Steve Schmit, and talked about Boston Terriers with Justin- the web guy. Schmitty and Kathyrn and I got into a pretty intense conversation about God in Vineeta's kitchen. When almost everyone was gone, Vineeta gave Justin and I a tour. What a cool house. This house is located south of Grand kind of near 35E. Three stories and a basement. We all went home around 11pm (which is really late when you work on the morning show).

Good time all around. I wish Cara could've come with, but it was important that she spend time with her brother's family before they left.

Here's Life Inner City Boxes of Love



Rob brought up an idea for a volunteer ministry for our small group. And since he brought it up, he was gracious enough to organize us in going through with it. So instead of meeting last night (like we usually do every Tuesday night) we met tonight at a warehouse in Minneapolis. The ministry is called Here's Life Inner City and the program we were working on is called Boxes of Love. What we did all evening was put together hundreds of boxes for needy inner city families. It was quite fun and we got to meet other people from our own church. It was really no sacrifice for us (other than we skipped watching LOST). Even Leesha was really helpful. She made bead bracelets that were included in every box.

When Leesha stays up past her bed time, its almost a guarantee that she will have a melt down. We were doing very well. In the car and on the way home, even. She was playing with my neck as I drove and trying to be playful, I bit her thumb- but I did it a just a little too hard. She pulled back and was real quiet. I could tell she was holding it in- not sure what to think of what just happened. I asked her if she was ok and if I bit too hard. That was her ticket to let loose.

Oh. My. Goodness!

She cried as hard as she possibly could! Which was fine. It was my fault. So we just let her cry. She eventually got tired of crying and forgave me. But that was kind of funny at first. Other than that, she was really really good. And even that wasn't bad. Just Melodramatic

Click for $.03, MTURK & Sleep

I got BJ and Seth started on this website. On this site you can actually earn money for simply clicking on which picture best describes the business presented. Its very strange- but they're paying, so don't complain.

Went to a sleep doctor today and set up an appointment to have a sleep study done on me. I suspect that I have apnea.

We had a bit of drama at home this evening. Leesha's math grade is slipping and it looks like its because she just doesn't care about her work. When confronted, Leesha dropped into a strange victim mentality claiming that when we praise her its too loud and hurts her ears. I pray that characteristic fades from her because there is no integrity a self proclaimed victim.

Cara and I had a very powerful prayer session together tonight. I love to pray with her.

Josh Moved

Josh and I loaded up a U-Haul van and my jeep full of his worldly materials and set off to his new residence. Josh and I met the maintenance guy who gave him the key to his apartment and we went all around looking for nicks and cracks to report so Josh wouldn't get charged for those things when he moves out.

After all was settled we started to unload. We got the jeep emptied out and had the van in position when Greg arrived. Unloaded and in the apartment, Greg and Josh took off to pick up more furniture from IKEA and somewhere else and get us some food while I stayed at the apartment and built a tv stand and waited for the bed delivery and the cable guy.

I finished quickly and laid down to read.

Soon everyone arrived at the same time. After the bed was in and everyone left, Josh went to drop off the van while Greg and I built a shelf. I love the fact that Greg and I can find any situation hilarious because we were laughing our asses off while trying to build that thing. Fun.

Not long after Schneidy returned the cable guy got there, too. And Greg had to leave. After all was settled in and the cable guy was gone, I too took off.

We talked about his recently ended relationship quite a bit and figured this move was a major step in the right direction.

I stopped in at the Shinder's just up the street from Josh's, the one I used to go to all the time. I also stopped at Hot Comics up in Richfield where Greg and I would go every Wednesday back in the golden age.

Felt good to use almost every muscle in my body. And it felt good to help a friend.

decision day

whether or not to commit to a different schedule. should i take the morning shift? and listen to George Noory every night on my way to work?

or

should i stay with this schedule, but have it go an hour later and miss dinner with my family and come home just as Leesha is going to bed?

the morning shift will free up some of the responsibility i have under Monica so that i may focus on more training.

the day shift would allow me to sleep more.