forget this place

Well, I recently discovered My Space on MSN and it is sooooo much easier to use than this place. I think I'm going to switch. Blogger.com has been good to me thus far, but now, I will put more energy into my MSN Space. You can find me at http://spaces.msn.com/members/chadisrad. I have cool photo albums and such that will make you want to move to the beautiful Northwest (if you don't already live here!). Anyways, maybe I'll be back here and there... but mostly over there. So you can change your links to my new one. Thanks. You're rad!

: : my mommy says I'm special : :

Special Ed maybe. My sister sent me a shirt that says what the title of this entry is. Boy, do I feel special! I've worn it twice now and I always get some sort of remark from it. Things like:

"I think you're special too..."
or
"Your mom's the only one that thinks you're special..."

I think I like the first one the best. At least the shirt is a good conversation starter.

Well, I have neglected this blog for quite sometime. I'm not promising that it will get any better, but I'm going to write stuff on here, even if it is pointless or has no point. Because, honestly, what's more fun than complete and utter randomness? Nothing.

Randomness begins here.

This morning I woke up thinking I slept in longer than I wanted to. So I hopped int he shower real quick, got dressed, brushed my teeth, let my dog out and headed off to work. While backing out of my driveway, I glanced at my clock (which has been screwed up since I bought my car) and then looked at my watch and realized that it was 8:00am, not 9:00am. I woke up an hour early and didn't even realize it until I was on my way to work. The good thing is that I didn't even feel groggy or anything. I actually felt pretty good, which is unusual for me in the morning. Anyways, being that early allowed me to finally take a couple of pictures of the billboard I designed that has been up sine January (I'm a slacker... what else can I say?).

My humidor I won on ebay is supposed to be shipped to me tomorrow, but I won't be home to receive it. What a crock!

passion

So I came to a realization the other night:
I've been living with a passion for life. Too bad it's not the passion that I should be living for. well, let me explain.

A passion for life isn't a bad thing, unless you are neglecting what should be your first passion, Christ.

I've been living with the thought that I don't want to die. I want my life to go on. I mean face it... sometimes life is hard, but really, life is pretty good. I've got good friends, good family, good job, a good car, a good place to live, etc. I mean yeah, I can complain about the fact the I turn 26 on Tuesday and have no wife, or girlfriend for that matter, but if I look past that, I'm really in a pretty good situation.

But through all this, I have been missing the big picture. I should be enjoying life as I seek out my number one passion, pleasing and living for the God that will one day judge my life. This should be the most important thing in my life, and I have been neglecting it.

I'll be honest... I have a hard time finding pleasure in reading and studying God's Word. It's always seems more like duty than delight for me. And that's actually been my prayer recently... that I would find delight in living for God and reading and studying and applying His Word to my life. The Bible says to know what God's Word says and not to follow it, is a sin. And it's a sin I've been struggling with. If you think of me sometime this week, will you pray that I would find delight in Him and reading His Word? I'd really appreciate it.

Anyways, I think it's time we all re-evaluate what our passions are and realign them appropriately. Make Chirst our first love, our prime passion.

I'm tired and have a headache, so my mind is done now. Peace out.

birthdays everywhere

Today is Sean Aaron Taylor's Birthday. He is turning 27. He's probably my closest friend right now. I get the joy of working with him. Smoking fine cigars with him. Talking about life with him. He's an amazing guy, has an amazing wife and child and I'm glad that he is my friend. :) So happy birthday Sean!

Tomorrow (May 19) is my dad's birthday. He'll be 49. He's really not very old. I have tone of friends who's parents are even past their 50's. So I guess my dad is relatively young. He still likes playing volleyball and wallyball, so he's stull pretty active. My dad was the dad who went to all of his kid's sporting events that he could get to. He has always been very supportive of me and my siblings. He is a loving husband (30 years this December - they're going on a Caribbean Cruise to celebrate) and a loving father. I love him and am so glad that he is my dad!

Tuesday (May 24) I turn 26. I always thought that I would be married by now, but I guess God knew otherwise. I mean jeesh, I don't even have a girlfriend. I can say that I'm glad it's in His timing and not mine. Anyways, I have a few goals for my 26th year of existance. I hope to find out if I would ever be able to afford to buy a house (the median home price right now is around $250,000). My bank has a pretty neat first time home buyers program that I hope to join... I'm thinking I'll probably wind up with a condo if I can afford anything. That's fine. I can build equity that way. Other than that, I hope to go on another mission trip or two. I have the opportunity to go several places: I could go to Haiti in November (somewhere I've never felt called to...but I want to be open to going where I'm called to...if God calls me there...) or I could go to Belgium in September (I've always wanted to go to Europe and what better reason than to go with a mission team?). In the spring of '06 I could go back to Mexico or possibly even back to Guatemala. I had such an amazing time on both trips that I would love to go back to either. So those are the things that aren't completely self-centered. I have other things I'd like, but I won't go into that.

I saw that Stacey did it and it seemed to work pretty well...if you want to send me something...a card, a gift, a care package, lots and lots of money...then you can send it to me at:
8079 Emery Rd
Lynden, WA 98264
But don't feel pressured to do so. I mean it's only my birthday...another one will come next year. Anyways, back to the birthday lists...

I know several people with a birthday on the 26th of this month...so Brent, Sean and whoever else it was I was talking to that had a birthday on the 26th...Happy Birthday. I'm out.

: : pretty colors : :

So the weekend of April 30/May 1, I was asked to play in a softball tournament. I love softball, so I obliged. I played on a team that called themselves the "Sex Panthers." I hear it comes from the movie Anchorman, but I never got to see the whole movie, so I never saw that part.

Anyways, the tournament was goig anlong pretty well. We played the first couple rounds of round robin and did fine until we got matched up against a team from a higher division. They beat us. But it was round robin, so it didn't matter. We played in the semis for our division and won. Sweet! We're in the finals...against a team we liked to call the "Angry" team. A few of their guys tried starting a fight with one of the upper division teams. What a bunch of morons. Anyways...we get to play in the finals. So we're going along in the game. We were winning. Then we were losing. Then it happened. I was playing third base. In the three previous games we played I had only gotten like two balls hit towards me. And in this final game, I got one more.

The batter wasn't huge in stature, but he was a good sized guy. He hit the ball HARD down the line. I think the ball skipped, not bounced (therefore keeping it's momentum) maybe two or three times as I moved to position myself to get in front of this routine grounder...because it was moving so quick, I didn't get all the way square to it before it got to me, missed my glove and went directly to my ankle. It didn't pass go or collect it's $200, but instead it smacked right into my ankle and then rolled over to the fence by the dugout. I chased it down and the guy made it to second as I attempted to throw him out.

At first the ball smacking right against my ankle didn't hurt. But then reality kicked in and the adrenaline was gone and it started to hurt like a mother...But get this, I played on. I sucked it up and continued to play. We lost the game. Took second. Not bad. Not the winners though.

Anyways, it's over a week later and my ankle is still swollen and black and blue and purple and yellow and all sorts of pretty colors. I went to the doctor last week Monday just to make sure it wasn't broken or anything (it's not). It doesn't hurt much anymore. Just feels like a bruise...with a big lump in the middle...perfectly circle...like it got hit with a ball. So yeah, check out the picture below. Nice, eh?

Have a good day. Stay out of the way of a fast moving softball!

Ball...meet ankle...ankle, meet ball

: : down the crapper : :

I fell down, into a burning ring of fire...

Johnny Cash. RIP.

Well, I'm a slacker. I know it, and you too, probably know it. It's obviously been a while since my last blog (but I did try to add one but when I told it to publish it went to an error page and then disappeared...I was so mad and tired that I didn't even bother re-writing it). So here now am I to explain the title, down the crapper. There are two reasone I titled it that: 1) the girl I mentioned in the last post, has gone down the crapper. 2) I'm doing a 10 day body cleanse and I have a lot of stuff going down the crapper.

1) Well, she didn't really go down the crapper. She is still an amazing girl. I've had plenty of time to think about what happened and even while it was happening I could see how it played out according to my prayers and the prayers my friends were praying for me.

Before I came into the picture of her life as someone who had an interest in her, she had been hanging out with a different guy (I found this out when I was about to ask her out...so it prolonged that a little bit). She had come to the realization through much prayer and conversation with God, that she wasn't at a place in her life where she didn't feel that God wanted her to be in a relationship. (Plus I heard the other guy was a bit of a jerk, but I don't think she would tell you that) And then I come along.

I've known her room mates since high school. And since about November or December of last year I started noticing her more. Things about her that I was looking for. Things about her that would make awesome qualities as a wife. I noticed her spunk. Her style. Her love of worship. And I thought to myself, what a wonderful girl. If you know me at all, you know I am pretty much afraid of girls that I like. I want to talk to them, but it scares the bageebees out of me. But, it became known by some of her friends that I was interested in her. And then after her decision with the other guy, she became aware that I was interested in her. And then her friends starteda sking me when I was going to ask her out. And so, I finally got the gull, the spine, the intestinal fortitude to swallow my pride and ask her out. I was very sincere and creative about it (it's along story, but shortened...I was given $100 by a person at church, to be a "date fund" so I took $20 of it and put it in a card and left it for her at work saying that we should be creative and use the money for something fun...she said it was soooo sweet and creative and that she would love to do that).

Conflict number one arises. She goes to work about the time that I get off of work. Well, this is no good. But, we find a time where we get to go out for about two hours. Two hours ain't much in trying to get to know someone, but we took full advantage of it. She's an awesome girl. That's all I have to say.

Anyways, I go to Mexico and when I get back I want to try and find time to hang out with her, but I get no return calls and no return text messages. She calls me on Wednesday and leaves a message saying we need to talk about some stuff. My heart sank into my chest and I knew it was not good. I returned her call, left a meassage and then she called me back. She told me the story of the other guy and then I came along and she was all confused, like "God, what are you doing?" So she had spent a lot of time in prayer about it and had come again to the realization that she wasn't in the place where she felt she should be in a relationship. (coincidentally, this is not the first time I have been told this...in fact it's not the second time either...) And me, being the kind, considerate one, I understand. Does it suck? Absolutely, it sucks. But who am I to say no to what she feels is God's calling on her life? (on the plus side, she did tell me that I am probably the nicest guy she has ever met...BONUS!)

All that to say that I am glad it happened that way, because all my friends and I were praying for was that we would seek God's will through the whole beginning of this relationship. And even still, I am seeking His will in it. I don't know if in the future things will work out between us. I personally hope they do, but if they don't, God has someone way cooler than her for me. I'm trying my best to not get hung up on it, but it's hard seeing her at church every weekend and still being like, "DANG! This girl is HOT!" Anyways, enough of my girl stories.

2) I'm on a ten day body cleanse and I think it's going okay. The thing that is killing me is the bloody diet. I have never been, nor will I ever be, a good dieter. I was a wrestler. We don't know how to diet properly. We sweat weight off and starve ourselves...and spit into bottles...

I'm not allowed to have carbs, sugar or fat. That means no cheese, no pasta, no potatoes, no beef, no alfredo sauce, no sour cream...loads of other stuff...but I'm supposed to be eatting lots of veggies. I have never, in my life, eatten lots of veggies. I'm struggling. All I want right now is a bag of peanut butter M&M's. And a can of Coke. Yes, that sounds nice.

Well, this thing is a novel that no one will read in the first place, so off I go, into never never land.

I should fire myself

Well, since I last posted...a long time ago...a lot has happened.
1) I moved.
2) I met a girl (well, I met her a long time ago...but now there may be a new horizon...).
3) I went to Mexico.
4) I got fat. Well, I continually get fatter since the day I graduated. I have just began to feel more out of shape than ever and it makes me sick.

Softball season starts in three weeks and I am stoked about that. Even though my wrist is still screwed up from playing so much lst year, I'm still looking forward to playing. I think it may either be carpal tunnel or tendanitis. Either way, it hurts a lot at times, and not at all at other times. Weird. Anyways, first game is April 22. It's time!

This Saturday I am going to the Mariner's game. It should be pretty fun. They're playing the Rangers. The thing that will make it so fun is going with Sarah. She is neat.

Now to the things that have happened since my last post.
1) I moved. Well, if you read my last post, you knew that I was moving. Well, I did and it is neat.
2) I met a girl. Her name is Sarah. I am taking her to the Mariners game. It will be neat.
3) I went to Mexico. It was an amazing trip. Life changing really. It's funny how you go to build a house for a family and hope to bless them, but in return you leave feeling more blessed than they are. Awesome. The only bad thing about the trip was the 36 hour van ride down and the 36 hour van ride back. 72 hours of my life spent in a 15 passenger van with 15 passengers in it, that I will never get back. Oh well, it was still an awesome trip. Maybe one day I'll put a few pictures up.
4) I got fat. Well, self explanitory I guess. If you don't get it, try sitting in front of a computer all day and don't excercise any, eat junk food and watch a lot of TV.

One last thing, then I am done. Someday Soon, my band...well, I just thought of another thing...back to my band...we're actully going to play a worship event that has nothing to do with my church or any of it affliliations! It will be awesome. We're playing at Christian Life Assembley in Langley, B.C. on Friday night. It will be an awesome night of worship for their youth group called Revolution. Neat-o.

The other thing...I found someone who is going to back my clothing line venture I have dreamed about for a few months now. It will be awesome. God has been giving me some cool t-shirt design ideas. It should be exciting. I'll let you know when more stuff develops.

Well, that's it. Have a happy day!