My New Name

1. YOUR SPY NAME: (middle name and current street name)
Killis Oxford (awesome)

2. YOUR MOVIE STAR NAME: (grandfather/grandmother on your dad's side, your favorite candy)
Guy Fifth Avenue (also awesome)

3. YOUR RAP NAME: (first initial of first name, first three or four letters of your last name)
B-Koon (sounds vaguely racist)

4. YOUR GAMER TAG: (a favorite color, a favorite animal)
Purple Falcon (sounds vaguely gay)

5. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born)
Killis Norman (sounds plausible)

6. YOUR STAR WARS NAME: (first 3 letters of your last name, last 3 letters of mother's maiden name, first 3 letters of your pet's name)
Koo-Bel-Mon (also sounds plausible)

7. JEDI NAME: (middle name spelled backwards, your mom's maiden name spelled backward)
Sillik Rehcleb (sounds evil)

8. SUPERHERO NAME: ("The", your favorite color, the automobile your mom drives)
The Purple Carvan (probably has lame super powers)

9. YOUR ACTION HERO NAME: (first name of a main character in the last movie you watched, last food you ate)
Cole Chicken (just plain retarded)

Over the Hill



Do you know what really gets my cliched goat? When people make a big deal of a 40th birthday. Actually, that's not so bad, but what really bothers me is when people make a big deal of one being over the hill or inches from death's door. What is funny about a coffin "gift" box filled with "YOU'RE TURNING 40! (and therefore you must be dying)" crap? This is especially strange now that 50 is the new 40.

Like I said, I don't mind celebrating the big (or little) 4-0, but it should be just like the big 2-1 (only probably less drinking) or any other age.

Anniversaries of birth should be days to remind the Birthday Boy/Girl that you love them, not to remind them they're one year closer to grave, even if it is supposed to be funny.

Hell in a handbasket. Hell in a frickin' handbasket.

Oh, and is it just me, or is Hilary flashing gang signs?

Potential comment A: It's been a proud couple of weeks for journalists.
Potential comment B: She can't help it, she's TV.

Grillin' in the Rain

Doo-dloo-doo-doo-doo
Doo-dloo-doo-doo-doo-doo
Doo-dloo-doo-doo-doo-doo
Doo-dloo-doo-doo-doo-doo...

I'm grillin' in the rain
Just grillin' in the rain
What a glorious feelin'
I'm happy again

I'm laughing at clouds
So dark up above
The sun's in my heart
And I'm ready for love

Let the stormy clouds chase
Everyone join the race
Come on with the rain
I've a six steaks to place

I walk down the lane
With a happy refrain
Just grillin',
Grillin' in the rain.

The last three times I cooked on my massive charcoal grill, it was snowing, sleeting and finally raining. Good times. There's something undeniably manly about grilling (which is why it's the only type of cooking in which a majority of men will take the time to become competent). Toss in stupidity of standing out in the rain trying to make fire, and it's uber-manly. It's primal. It's a link thousands of years into the past to Adam who, after being kicked out of the garden of Eden, realized he had not just been naming a list of creatures, he'd been creating a menu.

If you want an example that didn't damn all mankind to a life of sin and proves the holiness of grilling in less than dry conditions, take Elijah. In I Kings 18, Elijah the prophet made a bonfire, threw on some steaks then poured water all over it, only to have God prove his might by hurling down great fireballs from Heaven, thus proving that Baal was false god.

So far God has not made Himself available to help get my fires to light, but a good dose of lighter fluid - even the cheap generic kind - will overcome all but the most stubborn precipitation.

Sure you, do sort of have to rush the meat from the grill to the great indoors before the rain and mar it's well-done goodness, but that's a small price to pay for the hissing and sizzling that occurs each time a rain drop hits the 500-degree lid of the grill. The best is when it's covered in snow and ice: it slowly begins to melt then all at once you have a water fall gushing onto your deck while your burgers are getting ready to flip.

"Truth has nothing to fear from conflict."
- Thomas Jefferson

"SMALL, LOCAL, OLD and PARTICULAR are almost always better than BIG, GLOBAL, NEW and ABSTRACT."

- Rod Deher

A Christmas Carol for the Year of Our Lord (Anno Domine), 2007

On this night of hope and salvation
One child lies embraced in a dream
Where each man regardless of station this night can now be redeemed

Where every man regardless of his nation, ancestral relation
On this night the past can fly away
And that dream we've dreamed most
That every child is held close
On this night that dream won't be betrayed

All as one! Raise your voices! Raise your voices!
All as one! All! Raise your voices!Raise your voices!
All rejoice! Anno Domine!

I hate lying.
I hate scheming.
I hate false naivete.
I hate deception.
I hate battingling egos.
I hate feigned modesty.
I hate conspriracy.
I hate innuendo.
I hate wolves in sheeps clothing.
I hate half-truths.
I hate intentional ommissions of fact.
I hate witch hunts.
I hate it when people automatically assume the worst about actions and motives.
I hate it when people knowingly twist the truth.
I hate clandetine attempts to gain personal glory or fame.
I hate lying.

I'm not a theologian and I do not claim to be able to correctly interpret John 8:32. Still, I'll take my best shot at "You will know the truth and the truth shall set you free."

I've always thought this an excellent verse to live by as a journalist. One of my fellow jouralism majors at OBU told me that here truth was metaphor for Jesus (after all, Jesus does refer to himself as "the way, the truth and the life" (John 14:6) and Jesus can set us free). I maintain the "truth" refers to the Gospel and God's Word and therefor I think it applies to all truth in general, since the Gospel is literally nothing if not true. Therefor as a Christian and journalist, I should strive for nothing less that 100 percent prime choice USDA certified grade-A TRUTH.

All that to restate my first point. I hate lying. Truely (ha!), honesty is the best policy according to God. Not only is lying the direct opposite of honesty, it's explicitly forbidden by the ninth commandment. Is it any wonder Satan is somtimes called "The Deceiver?"

It's sad day when people you know cling to lies with grips so firm their mental knuckles turn white and they begin to sincerely believe their own lies. It's even worse when they've been decieved (by Satan or something less malevolent) and they velieve they know what is best for leading Kingdom work.

There. I said it. It's not too well thought out or organized but you get the picture.

I HATE LYING!

It is widely accepted among theologians that among God's better (yet more unknown) gifts to mankind is... 2-in-1 Shampoo + Conditioner.

To ask for anything more would be ungrateful and potentially blasphemous.

But lo, God, in His infinite wisdom, has deemed mankind ready to handle...

3-in-1 SHAMPOO + CONDITIONER + BODY WASH!

Seriously, a big shout out of thanks to my boys at Dial. The 12 seconds you've saved me each morning shall not go unwasted.

Now, if we can just produce a 4-in-1 that includes toothpaste, I'll be set for life.