charlieDEAN’S Blog

• Broncos are looking strong — although I refuse to get my hopes too high, becuase the road to the Super Bowl goes through Indianapolis — and they’re in a different league than the rest of the NFL so far!
• Bears fans — chill out! You have a weak schedule — true you’ve won 7 in a row, and the Panthers are a decent team — but we’ll see when you travel to Pittsburg in 2 weeks if you’re the real deal, or a big fish in a little pond. (And don’t look past Green Bay — old rivals aren’t cast off all that easy!) That being said, as the team of my childhood (I cried when they lost to Miami on Monday night in ‘85 — and I’m not being metaphorical.), I’d like to see the Bears win — it’s just the Bears’ fans that are starting to irritate!
• LT continues to save my fantasy team!

Short take: fun movie — visual effects are spectacular, the scene in the end with Voldemort and the death eaters, is perfect.

If you haven’t read the books, I think you’ll be hopelessly lost. Editing was choppy and hence the story had unexplained holes.

In the end, this is really a movie for fans of the books, not for the general moviegoing audience at large.

I’ve been walking through some pretty rough waters the last couple of weeks. I’ve had to make some hard decisions that I can’t go into detail about in this forum. But here are two questions I have:

Why are people so quick to think that everyone else has evil motives? This has been brewing for the last couple months with various situations. I know my own intentions, and generally they’re good. They may not always look that way, and I know that I’m not very graceful, but generally I’m at least well-intentioned. I think we’d all say that about ourselves. But when it comes to other people, we’re very quick to assign all kinds of evil motives. It doesn’t seem right.

Why are people so afraid to get the truth of a matter? It seems that people prefer gossip, innuendo, and whispered conversations over honest, face-to-face encounters where we start with questions (“Can you help me to understand something…”) rather than accusations. I hate knowing that stuff is brewing, and yet not knowing where I stand with anyone because people would rather talk about me than to me.

That’s all I can say for now!

• Broncos are looking strong — although I refuse to get my hopes too high, becuase the road to the Super Bowl goes through Indianapolis — and they’re in a different league than the rest of the NFL so far!
• Bears fans — chill out! You have a weak schedule — true you’ve won 7 in a row, and the Panthers are a decent team — but we’ll see when you travel to Pittsburg in 2 weeks if you’re the real deal, or a big fish in a little pond. (And don’t look past Green Bay — old rivals aren’t cast off all that easy!) That being said, as the team of my childhood (I cried when they lost to Miami on Monday night in ‘85 — and I’m not being metaphorical.), I’d like to see the Bears win — it’s just the Bears’ fans that are starting to irritate!
• LT continues to save my fantasy team!

Short take: fun movie — visual effects are spectacular, the scene in the end with Voldemort and the death eaters, is perfect.

If you haven’t read the books, I think you’ll be hopelessly lost. Editing was choppy and hence the story had unexplained holes.

In the end, this is really a movie for fans of the books, not for the general moviegoing audience at large.

I’ve been walking through some pretty rough waters the last couple of weeks. I’ve had to make some hard decisions that I can’t go into detail about in this forum. But here are two questions I have:

Why are people so quick to think that everyone else has evil motives? This has been brewing for the last couple months with various situations. I know my own intentions, and generally they’re good. They may not always look that way, and I know that I’m not very graceful, but generally I’m at least well-intentioned. I think we’d all say that about ourselves. But when it comes to other people, we’re very quick to assign all kinds of evil motives. It doesn’t seem right.

Why are people so afraid to get the truth of a matter? It seems that people prefer gossip, innuendo, and whispered conversations over honest, face-to-face encounters where we start with questions (“Can you help me to understand something…”) rather than accusations. I hate knowing that stuff is brewing, and yet not knowing where I stand with anyone because people would rather talk about me than to me.

That’s all I can say for now!

especially if you’re in church work…click on concerned attender voicemail (sadly, these kind of phone calls aren’t unusual)… THEN, click on the remix!

here it is

especially if you’re in church work…click on concerned attender voicemail (sadly, these kind of phone calls aren’t unusual)… THEN, click on the remix!

here it is

A couple months ago I started listening to the Bible every day on my way to work on my MP3 player. Here’s my admission — it’s tough getting through the pentateuch! I know that it’s chic to be into the OT (ala Rob Bell). And I really do love a lot of the OT, but right now Deuteronomy is killing me and every morning it’s a battle not to just give up and skip ahead to Joshua. (I do much better with stories!)

I feel a little bit like a slacker — here I have an M.Div. and I’m struggling with listening to the Bible! Not sure why I felt the need to share.

Today, I’m sorting through stuff in my office. I am teaching at New Community tomorrow night, and I find easier to stay focused during message prep if my office is clear of clutter. Anyway, one of the things I’m sorting out right now is music. Every couple months I get a box of CDs and books from Relevant. In the past I haven’t been very faithful with this resource, but I’ve tried to start taking some time to actually work through some of the content. So this morning, I’m sitting here with my cup o’ joe and giving CD’s a listen. (I know, it really is one of the more exciting facets of my job and I recognize that right now you wish you were me!)

Anyway, here’s my realization about myself. I’m not a “soft music” guy. There are very few “acoustic” CD’s that really get me jazzed. Case in point: Shane and Shane. I think their lyrics are pretty solid, and they’ve got considerable skill — basically I have no complaints about their music — except that I’m bored (As I type this, I have a window open watching the DVD from “An Evening With Shane & Shane.”) This is TOTALLY a matter of preference (I’m not knocking Shane & Shane, so chill out!). I like slow songs, I like acoustic songs, I really dig when artist redo songs acoustically (case in point — Alanis Morrissette, Jaggad Little Pill Unplugged), it’s just that I can only handle acoustic music in small doses. (Enter affinity toward DMB — usually a good mixture of mellow/introspective, with grooving rock tunes).

Okay — one dig on Shane & Shane — their voices really do drive me nuts after about 3 songs. They tend to wade in Aaron Neville-ish waters — and don’t get me started on Aaron Neville! (who are the peolpe that buy his CDs? Really! Who?)