Random Thoughts

I just put some more photos up on the photo blog. Robyn and I walked around Lake Girard tonight after dinner during Golden Hour. We didn’t quite get a whole hour, but we did get some nice shots. Here are my favorites…

Click for the photo page

I finally got around to editing our Christmas photos and throwing them up to the photo site. You can click on the photo below to see more. It was a good day, and a good week. Enjoy!

I’m sure it will be comforting to many of you that I’m back in the land of the connected. Actually, I never left, I just pulled the plug for a bit. It was an experiment of sorts to see if I could survive a week without blogs, e-mail, Facebook and Twitter. Turns out it was easier than I thought. When I came back online this morning, it took me less than 2 hours to go through my e-mail and get caught up on the blogs I follow. I checked in on Facebook (not a whole lot new there either) and just let my Twitter feed go. Maybe it’s because this is a holiday week and everyone has slowed down, or maybe I place too much importance on those things during the rest of the year.

So what did I do on my week off? Not a whole lot. And that was by design. I slept in every day until at least 9 AM. I normally don’t sleep that well, and it takes taking a week off to realize how tired I am most of the time. Possible goal for 2009; go see a sleep specialist and find out why I can’t sleep.

My wife, oldest daughter and I walked up and down Summit Ave. in St. Paul one afternoon. For those unfamiliar, Summit Ave contains the largest collection of Victorian architecture in the US. There are some simply amazing houses there. I would have pictures except every one of my rechargeable batteries failed in my camera when I tried to take a few shots. The sidewalks were largely iced over, so it was as much an exercise in balance as anything else. We’ll go back in the spring…

After the rechargeable battery debacle, I spent several hours researching battery chemistry. I learned a lot, and once my new batteries get here, I’ll have more to say about that. Like everything else, the equipment has to be matched to the application, and mine was not. In the end, it’s good news for churches who are looking to spend less money on batteries. Look for some posts on this topic in the coming months.

I got to run the snow blower a few times, which is always fun when you have a new snow blower. I’m sure that will wear off by March, but for now I’m looking forward to more snow…

We watched a lot of Discovery HD. I missed Planet Earth the first time it came out, so I TiVo’d the ones they’re running this week. It’s truly fascinating, and I found myself asking over and over, “How did they get that shot?” Even the girls enjoyed it. I also became totally addicted to Storm Chasers.

I bought a new DVD player when our 10-year old Sony decided to stop playing brand new CDs. I still can’t quite justify spending the coin on Blu-Ray (especially since I can download HD movies to my TiVo from Netflix), so I spent $58 on an upconverting Toshiba. I’ll have to say the picture of an upconverted DVD sent to my 50″ DLP is pretty amazing. We watched Prince Caspian last night and the picture blew me away.

I also spent some time just listening to music. I haven’t been able to do that in a while, and it was good to sit and listen. Of course, I had to fiddle with the various surround modes of my receiver, tweak the tone controls and mess with speaker distances, but I did enjoy the music.

Having some time off gave me an opportunity to read as well. I re-read a book from my college days, On Writing Well by William Zinsser. I had forgotten what a great book that is. I have also started The Shack. I wasn’t prepared for how good that was going to be either.

Finally, I put some structure to a book that’s been rattling around in my head for nearly a year. I have started writing it twice, and now that I have a plan, I expect to make some good progress on it by mid-year. Though the primary topic is the technical arts in the church, it’s probably not going to be what you expect. More to come.

So that was my week off. I still have 3 more days before I’m back to work. We have a few more movies to watch, and tomorrow the girls and I are trekking down to Minneapolis to walk around and have lunch. And it’s supposed to snow, so I may get the snow blower out again!

Happy New Year!

Be forewarned: This is likely to turn into a rant. I should have probably blogged about this sooner so I wouldn’t be so aggravated about the constant media barrage telling us we’re all one (slippery) step from living in a cardboard box down by the river. I’ve been thinking a lot about this over the last few weeks, and there are a jumble of thoughts in my head. Hopefully by the time I’m done, this will make sense.

First, a reality check. While it’s impossible to pick up a paper, read an internet news site, watch TV or talk to another human without being told that unemployment is soaring through the roof and we’re approaching another depression, the fact is, we’re not. At least not yet. Let’s look at the facts. The last time I checked (about 3 days ago), unemployment was at 6.7%. Of course, the media (almost gleefully) predicted that it’s rapidly heading toward 6.8%. Yet here’s another statistic they never, ever mention; 4-5% “unemployment” is considered full employment. That’s because there are a lot of people who don’t want to be employed, are taking a break or whatever. It’s pretty darn near impossible to get to 100% employment. So when we factor the statistical full employment figure into the unemployment figure that’s causing widespread panic, we see that true unemployment is about 2.7-3.7%. Now, I don’t want to make light of those who have lost their jobs, because that does suck, seriously, we’re running off the cliff because fewer than 4% of us are out of work?

And let’s not forget that under the media’s darling, former President Clinton, unemployment peaked at 6.7%. They never mention that for some reason. Under Reagan, it was even worse, getting close to 10%. Still, that means that 90% of the people in this country had a job. 

And it’s not like being out of work for a little bit puts you out onto the street in this country. Despite what the media keeps telling us, we have a pretty great safety net here, especially compared to the rest of the world. It should also be noted that unemployment rates of 30-50% are pretty common in other parts of the world, so let’s keep it in perspective.

The next thing we see causing panic is that retailers are in a tizzy because Christmas spending is down this year. Again, I hate to sound calloused, but maybe that’s not a bad thing. Again, compared to much of the rest of the world, we Americans live lives of wretched excess. We have almost as many TVs as we do people; 3/4 of us have cell phones; we need to keep buying bigger and bigger houses just to store all of our crap, and when even that is not enough, we rent storage units to store even more crap. So yeah, maybe it’s time we backed off the excessive, wasteful spending that’s put us in the hole for so many years. They say that the savings rate for most American’s is near 0%, which means that we spend every last dollar that comes into our hands (and then some, because few of us can go for long without breaking out the credit card…). 

Maybe it’s not a bad thing that instead of continually filling our too-big homes with more stuff, we keep a little of it in the bank for a bit. Which brings me to my next point. We received a prayer request at church today about a woman who is worried about losing her job (and she’s worried about her boyfriend, who works at the same company). So I have some hard news for you. And I say this with compassion, as someone who has spent some time out of work, and had 2 companies collapse around him; your employer is not responsible for keeping you employed–you are. For some crazy reason, many, if not most, people cling to the antiquated notion that just because an employer hires you, they owe you that job for as long as you want it. If you find something better, of course, you’re free to leave (with 2 weeks notice–or less). However, we expect our employers to see to it that our jobs are safe forever. Rubbish. 

If you’re worried about losing your job, polish up your resume, get your ducks in a row and start networking with people. Go find another job before you lose the one you have now. Even in a down economy, employers are always looking for good people. But there’s the rub, you have to be good. And that’s the problem. Most employees are lazy. They show up at work, give a half-hearted effort to their job, then leave. Should they be let go, they act all incredulous about their downsizing. Look, rarely are entire companies shut down. When layoffs come, the really good people are retained. This is not always true, but most of the time it is. So you need to be good. You should be so valuable to your employer that they will figure out a way to keep you around even if your entire department is shut down. And if they can’t, you should have no problem finding another job somewhere else. But that takes work, and most people aren’t willing to that. So deal.

Oh, and one more parting shot about staying employed. If you’re in an industry that’s on the decline, say the US auto industry, it might be a good idea for you to consider looking into a new line of work. And I don’t say that flippantly. I say that as someone who’s done that; 4 times. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, just because you’ve worked for GM for the last 10 years, doesn’t mean they owe you 20 more. A company can only turn out substandard products that don’t compete with the rest of the marketplace for so long before things need to change. Get over it. 

Which brings me to my next point (I told you this would be a rant). This aforementioned person is also worried that her boyfriend, who just bought a house, might lose that house if he’s let go. Though my head is about to explode as I write this, I’m trying to say it with love. If you bought a house and can’t survive a few months of unemployment without risking losing the house, you should not have bought it in the first place. This circles back to an earlier point. We’re so heavily leveraged as a country, we can’t survive even temporary and short income losses. That is crazy. Really smart financial people will tell you that you should have at least 3-6 months of income in the bank at all times. The reason is simple; if you lose your job, you need some runway to find another one. Unemployment compensation should slow your burn rate enough that you have time to get another job before you run out of cash.

If these concepts don’t make any sense to you, it’s likely that you need to move back into your parents house and live with them for a while until you figure out how to live with financial responsibility on your own. It’s a sad reality that this isn’t taught in schools, and most parents shirk the duty to teach their kids to be responsible with their money. And we wonder how we got here…

If you don’t have that safety net set up, you need to work towards that, fast. And that might mean not buying two new flat screens this year just because they’re on sale at Best Buy. Everyone knows I’m a pretty big fan of Apple products. They’re well designed, work well and are just a pleasure to use. I’ve also become a big fan of the way the company has handled it’s finances. In a recent call, analysts were asking Steve Jobs if he was worried about the economic downturn. He said that Apple is currently debt-free and has $26 Billion in the bank. So no, he’s not to worried. 

Now, it’s easy to say, “Sure, he’s Steve Jobs, multi-billionaire, why would he be worried.” But think about it. If we were debt-free and had even $26 Thousand in the bank, would we be worried about an economic downturn? I think not. One of our goals here in Minneapolis is to buy a house. We’re waiting a while, however, As much as it kills me to pay rent, and even though we have enough income to qualify for a mortgage, we’re waiting until we have some money (at least $20-30K) socked away. And to get there, it means we’re living pretty lean for the time being. Instead of raising our standard of living to our current income level, I’m trying to find ways to lower our expenses and increase our savings rate. 

That way, when we do buy a house, it won’t be 99% financed from the get-go, and we’ll have some savings in case we need it. I could go on for another 1,200 words about the housing “crisis,” but I’ll save that for another time. Same goes for the Wall Street “collapse.” All I’ll say here is that you can only sustain artificially inflated values for so long before they have to come back down. I mean, seriously, a 60-year old, 1,200 sq. ft. ranch (or “rambler”) here in the Twin Cities selling for $250K? Right. Call me when you get to $150.

All of this sounds rather harsh when I look back on it, but I wanted to inject a dose of reality here. First, we need to keep in mind that even though things are slowing down here, we still have it pretty darn good compared to much of the world. So chill. Second, we need to turn off the negative voices. If it bleeds it leads, and that’s what we get from the media. So ignore it. And don’t listen to the politicos, either. And pray they don’t try to “fix” it. Every time the government gets involved with “fixing” the economy we get the shaft. Sure, some AIG execs get to go on a nice vacation in the Caribbean, but we’re stuck with the tab. 

Stop asking for handouts and do something for yourself. One of the reasons our family as never ended up on the street is that I’m always “worried” about losing my job. Even though my job is somewhat secure for the time being, I’ve already updated my resume, I’ve been doing some networking and I have a new website ready to launch (and I continually update it off-line) the day I hear my job is being cut. Will it be cut? I don’t know. But if it does, I won’t be caught off guard. We have enough cash in the bank right now to survive for several months with minimal pain. So am I worried that when Upper Room moves I won’t be working there? No. I’m prepared, and I’m being realistic about it. If the budget gets cut, and my job goes with it, I’ll be ready.

And that’s why I’m focusing on doing the best job I can possibly do right now instead of worrying that I’ll be unemployed in 3 months.

That’s it. End of rant. Please excuse me while I update my resume with my most recent accomplishments and prepare my new website…just in case.

Yesterday I buried my father. It was one of the most difficult days of my life. For those who don’t know, he died quite suddenly on October 31. He was in the hospital undergoing what we thought was going to be a fairly routine procedure designed to correct some of the problems he was having with his heart. Complications ensued, and he died on the table. He had told my sister earlier in the week that he planned on being home Saturday afternoon. I talked with him 2 weeks prior, and he told me the same thing. I was going to call him that weekend. Sadly, I never got the chance.

Yesterday, I was given an opportunity to say a few words at the funeral service. The following is what I said. Well, it’s actually the improved version of what I would have said had I been able to speak clearly. I was completely unprepared for the flood of emotions that hit me when I got up to speak. So this is the what was in my head–even if it didn’t all come out.

My father and I didn’t always have the best relationship. However, I’m so thankful for the last 12 years that we had together, especially the ‘cabin’ years. The cabin became our rallying point; and looking back on it now, our time of working on the camp brought out so many of Dad’s characteristics. Dad was a very genuine guy. What you saw was what you got. There was no pretense about him. He was the same person everywhere he went.

One thing about Dad was that he was an “all-in” kind of guy. When he took on a project, it was all or nothing. That was made manifest in our cabin. Over the course of a few years, we turned a pretty ramshackle place into what was affectionately known as the “Taj Mahal.”

He also taught me that if something is worth doing, it’s worth doing right. Once again, the cabin is the perfect illustration. When we were trying to decide how to finish off the interior of the place, everyone told us to just leave it as studs and sheathing. We took another route. We insulated, vapor barriered, and drywalled. We had an 80 gallon hot water heater for crying out loud. When it was done, it was done right. 

I marveled at his ability to talk with anyone like he’d known them for years. Someone said that my Dad never met a stranger. When we would run into towns for supplies, which happened quite often–sometimes multiple times a day, he would always strike up a conversation with the clerk at the store, someone in town, or the waitress at the restaurant. He made everyone feel important and was genuinely interested in them. I’ve always envied that about him.

He also had the ability to make just about everything fun. He was known for his smile, and his laugh. He made up words that crack me up to this day. I laughed every time he would ask for a hammer by saying, “Son, hand me a schalaylee, would ya?” We worked really hard on that camp, but we had a lot of fun, too.

Which is not to say that everything always went smoothly. Last night, I was thinking of one particularly memorable story.And since Dad was also known for his stories, I’ll share this with you. Dad, my brother and I were up there one fall getting ready to close up. One of our tasks that trip was to install the range hood vent–because all camps need a range hood vent, right? I told you he was a “do it right” kind of guy. Anyway, we spent most of dinner gripping about the electrician and how the guy didn’t run power down to where the range hood was going to go. All three of us took turns throwing jabs at this incompetent electrician. Of course, Dad was the electrician.

The solution was for me to climb up into the attic and identify a cable we could junction off and run down the wall over the range. I found the circuit we needed and got ready to cut into the cable. Before I did I shouted down, “Dad, make sure the breaker’s flipped on this, OK?” “Yup,” he shouted as I heard him tromp back to the bedroom where the panel was. I heard a breaker flip, and he tromped back to the kitchen to check his work. “Alright, son, should be all set,” he shouted up into the attic. I grabbed my lineman’s pliers and prepared to cut. Just before I did, I decided to turn my head, close my eyes and stretch away from the cable. When I squeezed the jaws together, there was a loud pop and a brilliant flash of light.

“You OK, Mike?” “Yeah, I’m fine.” “Well,” he said with a big laugh, “I guess that wasn’t it.” I had to laugh as well. “Nope, I guess not.” I looked over at my pliers, which had been given to me as a birthday present by his father, and noticing the large chunk that had been carved out by the arc I added, “And you owe me a pair of Kliens.” He just laughed, said “I guess I do. I’m just glad you’re OK.” 

Well, that Christmas, I did get a new set of Klines. Unlike my 30-year old set, these had rubber grips on them. He also got me a non-contact voltage tester so I wouldn’t be cutting into any more live wires. I’ve used those tools hundreds of times in the last few years. And now they will hold and even deeper meaning for me as they remain a lasting reminder of my father.

I’ll miss you, Dad.

“Cause I live in a van, down by the river!” One of my favorite Chris Farley scenes ever. Today, I went down by the river. The Minnesota River, that is. I decided to take a drive down to nearby Shakopee and wander along the wandering river. I made my way down to the bank, and kept my eyes open. I had been wanting to try out some more HDR (High Dynamic Range) photos, so I brought along my tripod. 

HDR photos are created by shooting a series of bracketed shots (from 2 stops under exposed to 2 stops over exposed), and merging them together in Photoshop. When done correctly, the result is a  photo with significantly more dynamic range than you could achieve with a single shot. I shot four such photos, and one came out well. It’s the last photo of the series.

I was finishing shooting one HDR series, and out of the corner of my eye I saw movement. Two little birds with long legs were flitting around in the water. I quickly swapped lenses and put my long telephoto on. I spun the tripod around and started snapping shots. The little birds were quick, but I got a few good images.

I also came across a waterfall. I had been wanting to do more long exposure times with waterfalls, and this provided me a great opportunity. I nearly dunked myself in the creek in an effort to get in position; I hadn’t counted on the bank being so soft, and my foot sunk up to my ankle when I stepped to the edge. I actually wanted to climb out right into the water fall and shoot from there, but I couldn’t come up with a way to get out there and keep the camera safe and dry.

It was a great day of being outside. The light was nice, the temperature was just about perfect, and the sky couldn’t have been any bluer. I definitely want to go back to this spot in a few weeks when the leaves have turned. Check out the photos…

Now that Katie’s taking a photo class, we have to get out and do some regular photography. This is fine by me as I need an excuse to get out and shoot. Last week, she had some trouble getting her film developed, so we had to make an emergency trip to the camera store, buy some film stock (and the supplies to process it at home that night), and head out for a shoot.

She was looking for perspective and framing. I was looking for whatever looked cool. I had been wanting to head down to Minnehaha falls, as it’s supposed to be pretty neat. We found it, and started hiking. The falls are cool, and we found a trail that follows the creek. Eventually, the creek runs into the Mississippi, but we didn’t go that far. We did see some great photo opportunities, however. 

That night, we got Katie’s film processed, and hopefully I’ll be able to scan some of the prints and put them up. She has quite an eye. On the other hand, you can check out some of my favorite shots on the photo blog.

This past Sunday, we had a big announcement at Upper Room. The short story is that we’re going be planting Upper Room as a new independent church in a new location. You can read a lot more about it here.

Personally, I’m very excited about this move. I think it will be very good for Upper Room, and give us the opportunity to reach our target demographic more effectively. From a missional perspective, this is good. It will mean some changes, to be sure, but I’m not bothered by change. 

My role has already started to morph. I’m doing less and less video work, and more IT-related stuff. I’m currently in the midst of developing a project that would include setting up a new Mac Server (an XServe) and converting the UR staff over to all Macs. If you know me at all, you’ll know this fits in with my master plan from the start. And I’m getting better at it. It took me over a year at Crosswinds to start the transition to Macs. Here in under 9 months, I’ve been given the go-ahead to move us over. I should get commission. For real.

So there you go. Sorry I’ve not been updating here much, but most of my spare writing time goes into my Church Tech Arts blog. And I Twitter a lot, too.

How many times did you spell that as a kid? Hundreds, probably. Today, I not only spelled, but I walked over it, and next to it. I’m referring to the river, not the state. If you’re not up on your geography, the Mississippi River starts in Minnesota. And it runs through Minneapolis. Today, we decided to talk a walk next to Ole Miss, and see what we could see.

Turns out, there are some really sweet parks along the river in the Cities. We went to one called Mill Ruins. It’s so named because the “ruins” of a flour mill and associated water powered mills are there. It was actually quite interesting. I’m fascinated with what people could build before the modern age of concrete pumpers and huge cranes. 

We parked behind the Guthrie Theater, which is a local landmark. It’s also an engineering marvel. There is a cantilevered lookout balcony that extends a hundred foot or more with no vertical support. Seriously, it’s amazing. The balcony looks out over the river and to the Stone Arch Bridge, which was built in the 1800’s. The bridge spans the river, and is itself a marvel. Especially when one considers that it was built in a spot where the river fell a few hundred feed over just a few thousand feet. It used to look like Niagara Falls, so they say. But then they built a wooden spillway. Tough folks, these Minnesotians. 

Ironically, the 130+ year old Stone Arch Bridge is just a few hundred feet up river from the under 40 year old 35W bridge that collapsed just over a year ago. The new one is almost done. Let’s hope the new one is built more like the Stone Arch Bridge than the “modern” bridge that collapsed. I got a good view of just how far down it was when it fell. That would have been incredible (in a “scare the crap out of you” kind of way) to have seen that.

Anyway, take a look at some of the pictures I took today. I’m really pleased with a few of them.

Peace.