Fall Foliage

While in the car returning to Decorah from Chicago this weekend, I mentioned that for some reason, I thought this fall had the deepest, most beautiful colors I can remember. It seems as though all of the colors (at least in NE Iowa) are very deep and rich. I thought that it was probably just the fact that I hadn’t seen fall colors in a year, but Kelly said that this year’s colors are deeper, and there is an explanation for it.

The SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry says,

Temperature, light, and water supply have an influence on the degree and the duration of fall color. Low temperatures above freezing will favor anthocyanin formation producing bright reds in maples. However, early frost will weaken the brilliant red color. Rainy and/or overcast days tend to increase the intensity of fall colors.

Kelly said that Iowa has receieved the perfect amount of rain this year, therefore bringing out the deep colors that we see in this year’s foliage. Does anybody else think this year’s colors are especially brilliant?

Update: Kelly commented with a quote from the Wisconsin DNR:

The amount of rain in a year also affects autumn leaf color. A severe drought can delay the arrival of fall colors by a few weeks. A warm, wet period during fall will lower the intensity, or brightness, of autumn colors. A severe frost will kill the leaves, turning them brown and causing them to drop early. The best autumn colors come when there’s been:

a warm, wet spring

a summer that’s not too hot or dry, and

a fall with plenty of warm sunny days and cool nights.

Friday Linkfest

Here are this week’s links:

Glósóli: The music video for Sigur Rós’ “Glósóli”. I’ve watched it four or five times… it is absolutely beautiful and hopeful. The first time it brought me to tears. The combination of the music itself, the visuals and the unspoken message of the video is breathtaking. If you can’t see the video, you need to download Quicktime 7.

The Character of Theology: Jason Clark has an interesting post about this book on his weblog. This might be a good compliment to my current reading selection (A New Kind of Christian, A Generous Orthodoxy, both by Brian McLaren). He says “if… you value your evangelical heritage, appreciate the process the reformers undertook, and want to engage meaningfully with our post-modern context, this is the book for that.”

Midwest Fall Colors: The photographer says this beautiful picture “was taken along MN 60 between Wabasha and Zumbro Falls, Minnesota.”

The Dvorak Keyboard: “The layout [of the Dvorak keyboard] was designed in the 1920s and 30s to replace the QWERTY keyboard layout you probably have in front of you right now. Dvorak facilitates faster and easier typing by placing the most common letters on the home row, where they are right under your fingers instead of scattered around the keyboard.” You can even join the “Dvorak Campaign.” It’s probably like the metric system in the U.S. - it’s way better than what we have, but it’s too late to change now.

The Church of Hate: This video breaks my heart. Take twelve minutes to watch it. The video is an investigative report on a church in Kansas (which calls itself Christian, but strongly resembles a cult) that preaches hate. Against America, against homosexuals, against other countries, etc. They frequently have protests in which they carry the most horrible signs with sayings I do not care to publish here. The two girls interviewed at the end make me want to cry. Thanks to Shawn for the link.

Chicago Cubs Fleece: The White Sox may have won the World Series, but I still love the Cubbies. What better way to support the team than wearing this ultra comfortable fleece sweatshirt? Besides, Christmas is just around the corner… *wink*

Undeclared in the ICCA

Undeclared (website) has been selected as a participant in the 2006 International Championships of Collegiate A Cappella, or ICCA (website). I have been a member of Undeclared since midway through its first year of existence, and it has been one of my favorite experiences in college.

In 2004, Undeclared was selected as a performer in the ICCA. We placed second in the midwest quarterfinal, which sent us to the midwest regional. The top performer in regionals was awarded a trip to nationals (which is the finals, much like the Final Four in NCAA basketball), and we placed second at regionals out of the six that were there. The group that beat us went on to win the whole competition. You can see a summary of the 2004 competition here.

We took a year off and now we’re going to compete again. We’ll be performing in the quarterfinals at the University of Illinois on February 11, 2006. The ICCA website has a roundup of the competition. Until then, we’ll be working our tails off on the 12 minute set that we’ll perform.

Undeclared has two albums for sale here.

Music of the Month

Matt Wertz, Today & Tomorrow EP: Matt Wertz is my musical idol. Sometimes I say that it’s John Mayer, sometimes I say that it’s Matt Wertz; that’s because the decision is so difficult. I want my music to sound like Matt’s in one song and John’s in another. His last release, Twentythree Places, is one of my top 3 favorite albums of all time. His newest release, Today & Tomorrow, is a five song EP with three previously unreleased songs (”Like the Last Time,” “Wanderin’ Eyes,” and “Honest Man”) and two new versions of older songs (”Red Meets Blue” and “I’m Sorry Mary”). Although I wish it was a full length album, he manages to tide me over until his next full-length release. “Like the Last Time” is quickly climbing it’s way up the charts as my favorite Wertz song, and “I’m Sorry, Mary” sounds as good as it ever has. Did I mention that I am seeing him live next weekend in Chicago at the House of Blues? Favorite tracks: Like the Last Time, I’m Sorry, Mary

Blue Merle, Burning In the Sun: I first mentioned Blue Merle in a post a few weeks ago. Their music is really good, and very complimetary to the season of fall. A few days ago, someone said “I would classify this music as ‘cool to cold weather music’” in reference to another musician (Damien Rice), but I think it applies here as well. I’ve probably listened to the free live show they have available for download on their website more than the studio album, because I think it actually sounds better and I like the jams in the songs. Favorite tracks: Boxcar Racer, If I Could, Part of Your History

David Crowder Band, A Collision: Exactly one month ago today, I guaranteed that this album would be on this month’s Music of the Month post. It is difficult to explain how good this album is. It is DCB’s most diverse album to date, incorporating electronica, bluegrass, gospel, spoken word, strings, and others as well as the traditional DCB sound into the mix. David Crowder has a written explanation of every song on the album which is equally, if not more stunning than the album itself. At the moment, I can’t find the link, but I’ll keep looking. Favorite tracks: Be Lifted or Hope Rising, Do Not Move, Here Is Our King

Jack’s Mannequin, Everything In Transit: I read a review of this album in my school’s newspaper and found out that Jack’s Mannequin is the solo side project of the former frontman of Something Corporate. Not surprisingly, the album sounds a lot like Something Corporate, which is why I like it so much. There really isn’t much to say about this album except that it’s pretty good, and if you like Something Corporate, you’ll like this. Favorite tracks: The Mixed Tape, I’m Ready

Damien Rice, O: As I said earlier, this album is a perfect cool to cold weather album. It’s been out for a few years, but I couldn’t resist the temptation to bring it out because it fits the weather and my mood so well. His airy voice, smooth guitar, and tasteful string accompaniments are beautiful and soothing. Apparently Damien is working on his next studio release as we speak. Favorite tracks: Cannonball, Volcano, I Remember

The Fray, How to Save A Life: I can’t stop listening to this album. It hasn’t even started to get old yet. For a while, iTunes was offering a free download of “Over My Head (Cable Car).” These guys are going places. Favorite tracks: How to Save A Life, All at Once, Heaven Forbid

Friday Linkfest

Three comments saying that Friday Linkfest was missed. Here are this week’s (belated) links.

TactaPad: Check this thing out. If you ever saw Minority Report, you might remember Tom Cruise controlling the future computer with his hands. That’s what this thing is. Check out the demo videos.

Wikipedia Flaws: If you’ve ever used Wikipedia, an online user-contributed encyclopedia that covers just about everything, you should read this article from the original founder of the website.

iWay: A nifty tool for iPod users that combines the power of the iPod with Yahoo! Maps to make your iPod an on-the-go directions viewer.

Holy Ghost Tees: Ever wanted a vintage ringer t-shirt that speaks in toungues? Me either. But just in case you do… (Are they serious?)

Live8 DVDs: A five minute sampler video from the upcoming release of the 4-DVD set of Live8 concert series.

Fall Break: Update 2

Some new things and things I wish I would have put in the last post:

I uploaded some new pictures to Flickr. A couple from my performance on KWLC on the 13th and two other random ones.

In the last post, I said

It is 216 miles from my driveway to my parking spot in Decorah. Give or take a mile. The offramp where my car ended up is only 2 miles from my house. If you do the math, I made it more than 99% of the way home.

Well, I did the math, and I made it 99.2% home. My car ended up 1.7 miles from my house. You can look at this map for a better idea of how close I was.

I had an unbelievable time hanging out with Molly on Friday night.

I finished A New Kind of Christian. It seriously blew my mind. I cannot believe how good it was. If I can eventually process the whole thing, I’ll write about it.

I rented the movie High Tension, thinking it was going to be a good horror movie (I love horror movies). It wasn’t that bad, but it was super bloody. I laughed out loud on a couple occasions because it seemed so ridiculous. Plus, when I rented it, I didn’t know that it was originally French with English dub-overs. Threw me off.

I got a sweet comment on my post about writing a song with John Mayer. The commenter’s name is Fancy, and she says:

So hey i don’t know you or anything but i was searching for some reasearch about john mayer and i stumbled here and i listened to your song and i have to say it’s pretty sweet. i have heard a few other versions of the song on my travels and i think that you have made it meaningful and original. i think you’ve done john proud lol any who good going and keep up the great work.

Very nice comment.

Now I am back at school. My car made it.

Fall Break: An Update

I’ll give you a quick¹ update on what has been (and what will be) going on during fall break. Maybe I’ll do a full recap upon return to school.

On the way home Friday afternoon, I noticed the “battery” warning light was illuminated on my car’s dashboard. I didn’t think much of it. Until. I had to stop in Ames to drop something off at a friend’s place, and when I had to stop at a stoplight (the first time a stop was necessary in nearly 3 hours) my car stalled. Wouldn’t even turn over. I got out, extremely embarassed as all of Ames stared at the idiot with the stalled car, and took a seat on my trunk so as to direct traffic around me and to make frantic phone calls. It started again after a few minutes and got me to my friend’s place. On the way out of Ames, it stalled again. So I waited and everything worked out - the car started again. Between Ames and Des Moines, I had devised a perfect route that would require no stopping until I arrived at my house. The car only stalled if I had to stop, see. The car would have none of this scheming, however.

As I was driving on I-235, I turned on my lights because it was quickly getting dark. So I flipped the switch, but the lights didn’t come on. This concerned me for a minute or two until my concern quickly changed to the fact that my car was now losing power in surges and I knew that it would soon die. The car did not care that I was doing 75 on the freeway, enclosed on either side by cement blockades, no, it was going to die. What’s worse is that there is immense construction going on and a few of the normally existing bridges and offramps are now temporarily non-existant, thus eliminating several escape routes.

I floored it - as much as I could in the dying and sputtering car - with the intention of getting to the nearest offramp. About a half mile before my targeted offramp, the car gave up. I slowed and coasted onto the offramp and maneuvered my dead vehicle to the side of the ramp. I made the necessary phone calls - my mom - and sat by the side of the road, again looking like an idiot.

It is 216 miles from my driveway to my parking spot in Decorah. Give or take a mile. The offramp where my car ended up is only 2 miles from my house. If you do that math, I made it more than 99% of the way home. The 1% my car couldn’t go cost $60 for towing and $200 for an alternator. Welcome home, Jake. Welcome home.

Because that story ended up being longer than I had intended, I will make a bullet list of what has transpired since that incident.

I spent the time immediately following my car’s death (c. 9:30pm) until 8:00am hanging out with junior high students doing such things as roller-skaiting (not blading), broomball, bowling, and eating pizza at 4:00am. Good times.

I slept for 5 hours.

I woke up and went on some errands with my mom and then watched the first 5 episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Season 2.

Dinner.

Watched the movie The Machinist. Fell asleep shortly after at 9:15pm.

I woke up on Sunday at 12:30. That’s 16 hours of sleep, people.

Watched some football and worked a bit on my message (see below).

Went to Sunday youth group at Valley Church and gave a message on forgiveness. It was supposed to be 25 minutes - and I was scared I wouldn’t make it - but it ended up being 45.

Went to lunch at the new Chik-fil-A. It was decent.

Bought A New Kind of Christian by Brian McLaren and have been reading it since. Unbelievably good. More on that later.

Tomorrow I am going to see the movie Domino, starring my favorite actress (Keira Knightly) with my brother. I’ll probably read after that.

That’s it for now.²

1. Unfortunately, at home I am still limited by a dial-up connection, so a much longer and detailed post is out of the question. Not entirely, but mostly. ↩
2. I realize my previous annotation is almost invalidated. I guess it’s a good thing I said it wasn’t entirely out of the question. Gotcha. ↩

Fall Break

Today is the first day of fall break. I am volunteering at my church for an all night junior high event called “Blitz,” so I’ll be up all night hanging out with twelve year olds. I think that’s how old they are… Saturday I’ll hopefully get some sleep. Sunday I am speaking at HSM, the high school youth group, about forgiveness. I’m really excited to see all of the students I got to work with this summer. And then? I have no plans. Maybe I’ll finish Gilead and get my hands on A Generous Orthodoxy. I’ll be awaiting some more replies for the J-Term trip and I might make some phone calls.

Really, I am just excited to go home for a while.

Late Night Vocation Binge

I had been trying to fall asleep for nearly fourty minutes when my room phone rang. I decided that I wouldn’t answer it because if things had gone as planned, I would have already been asleep for a half hour and wouldn’t have heard the phone ring anyway. Shortly after, however, my cell phone rang. Because it was lying right next to my bed, I looked at the caller ID and it said “Tom.” I answered.

Tom explained to me that he, too, had been trying to sleep but found himself unable to enter a state of semi-consciousness because he had just read the first chapter of Finding the Open Road. I grabbed a packet of instant apple cider and made my way down to his room.

He told me that I should read the first chapter too, so I did. It was very inspirational, insofar as these people had done the same thing that Tom and I have been talking about nonstop. It turns out that these three guys who had done this a while ago have actually set up programs on college campuses nationwide so that students all over the nation can embark on road trips to find vocation. They even have grants available. Don’t worry, we applied.

Tom always says that true moments of creativity and inspiration are always spontaneous. You cannot plan for them. Last night was spontaneous. From 12:45 - 4:00am we worked on the trip. We emailed professors on campus. We emailed people about scholarship money. Most importanly, though, we came up with lists of people we really want to meet on this trip.

I sent out probably fifteen emails last night between the hours of 1 and 4am. A typical email presented our trip and asked if the person would be available for interview in January. I contacted the following people last night:

Marilynne Robinson, author of Gilead

Brian McLaren, Pastor and author of many emergent Christian books, including A Generous Orthodoxy

David Crowder, lead singer of the David Crowder Band

Cameron Strang, President/CEO of Relevant Media Group and founder of Relevant Magazine

Matt Wertz, one of my favorite singer/songwriters

Jason Kottke, founder of kottke.org, a famous weblog that is completely reader-supported

Joshua Griffin, manager of Purpose Driven Youth Ministry

Jim Wallis, editor-in-chief of Sojourners Magazine, and author of God’s Politics

David Beckmann, president of Bread for the World, “a nationwide Christian citizens movement seeking justice for the world’s hungry people by lobbying our nation’s decision makers.”

I found two events that would be great to add to the itinerary if possible. Politics and Spirituality: Seeking a Public Integrity is a conference taking place in Washington, D.C. January 14-16 that features Jim Wallis (Soujourners, God’s Politics), Anne Lamott, and Richard Rohr. Eugene Peterson, author of The Message and Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places, will be speaking at Calvin College in Michigan on January 24.

Another idea that I had, inspired in part by my good friend Mike, is to take 30-60 copies of the Gospel of John to give to various people during the month. That’s between one and two per day. This does two things, (1) it is an opportunity to spread the Gospel and (2) it “forces” me to initiate conversation with people I might not normally approach. I also decided that I want to visit some “out-of-the-box” grassroots Christian ministries. The search is still on for some of these.

Update: Companies/media that have been contacted thus far (will be updated as more are contacted):

Jones Soda

Red Bull

The Oprah Winfrey Show

Living In Iowa

Relevant Magazine

Campus Life Magazine

Real World Magazine

Honda

New American Dream

The Des Moines Register

The Cedar Rapids Gazette

Beyond Magazine

Ask not what you can do in your life. Ask what your life can do in you.

New Song: Freefall

I recorded one of my new songs tonight, entitled “Freefall.” The recording itself isn’t the best quality (i.e., Tom’s phone ringing in the middle of the first chorus, various “bumps” in the sound, my guitar being slightly out of tune, etc.), but it works. Someday I’ll get into a studio. For the select few who heard a “rough cut” of this song, this is a new recording.

You can download “Freefall” here. The lyrics are below.

I’m playing a set this coming Thursday the 13th on Luther’s radio station, KWLC. The station has a show called “30 Minutes on a Thursday” which features Luther students doing original music, and this week, I am the featured guest. Mike Lang (bassist for Damascus Avenue and all-around great guy) will be joining me. The show starts at 11:00pm and can be streamed live from KWLC’s website. I’ll be playing “Freefall” and a few other originals.

The lyrics:

Freefall
Words and music by Jake Bouma

Barely hanging on to every word you say
My grip is slipping away
The view from here shows me slowly falling behind
Wishing I could rewind

Well, I know you need some time
But baby you’ve gotta make up your mind

Hey, what do you want, baby?
You gotta let me know
So we can figure this out someday
I can take the hurt and I can stand the pain
Just tell me
Hey, what do you want, baby?

Open up my parachute to find
There’s not enough wind at this time
Now I’m grasping the gravity of it all
As I spin in this freefall

Well, I know you need some time
But baby you’ve gotta make up your mind

Hey, what do you want, baby?
You gotta let me know
So we can figure this out someday
I can take the hurt and I can stand the pain
Just tell me
Hey, what do you want, baby?

Love is patient, love is kind
And love hurts, but it’s worth it

Feel free to leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Blue Merle

I am always on the lookout for new music and new bands. In the past week, a couple of people have mentioned the band Blue Merle to me.¹ One of them told me that they sound like Nickel Creek mixed with Chris Martin, the lead singer of Coldplay. I agree with him to some extent, except that I would say their sounds is just more of a more laid back and folky Coldplay. In other words, it’s the perfect music to compliment my favorite season of the year: autumn.

I got a hold of Blue Merle’s debut CD (?)², Burning in the Sun a few days ago and I love it. If you’d like to get a sense of what they sound like without having to buy their CD or find someone who owns it (or… shhhh… download it), they are offering an entire live show to download for free on their website in the “downloads” section. It contains most of the music from Burning in the Sun and some other songs as well.

1. I originally said that one guy had mentioned them to me, but it slipped my mind that two people had mentioned them to me. Seth and Kristin. ↩
2. Seth informs me that yes, this is their debut album, recorded in February 2005 at Dave Matthews’ recording studio. ↩

Friday Linkfest

Here are this weeks links:

Visions of Science: BBC News’ top ten picks for scientific pictures. The first one is amazing.

Donald Miller’s new website: The author of one of my all-time favorite books, Blue Like Jazz, has a newly redesigned website. Relevant Magazine has a good interview with Don on their website. His new book, To Own a Dragon: Rewriting the Legacy of an Invisible Father, comes out next February.

Sorry, gotta go…: For those times when you need an excuse to get off the phone. There are some really funny ones. I’ve got to try this…

Anatomy of a Photograph: “An analysis of a single seemingly innocuous photograph, and the pervasive media bias it reveals.” This is both enlightening and disturbing.

Oh My Gosh!: I literally laughed out loud¹ when I stumbled on this photograph on Flickr.

A song-by-song analysis of DCB’s A Collision: If you own this album (even if you don’t) this is a must-read. In an era when a lot of (not all) worship music is just recycled and regurgitated, David Crowder puts a ton of thought into his music and lyrics. Also, “David Crowder Band’s third release, A Collision, ended up debuting at number 39 on the Billboard charts. This is DCB’s highest placement to date. Not bad for an album that was recorded in a barn in Waco, Texas².” - Relevant.

Google Search Tips 2005: Provides a bunch of search syntax basics and advanced tricks for Google. If you know exactly what you’re looking for, knowing these can greatly reduce unnecessary searching.

The Fray - A Review: Remember when I talked about The Fray and how big they’re going to be? I wasn’t lying, folks. From the aforementioned review: “Although it’s still premature to compare this band to the likes of greats such as U2 and Coldplay, The Fray possesses that same rare quality of undeniable musical talent and classic sound.”

The Bible, text message style: Someone from Australia went and translated the entire Bible (CEV) in to text for cell phones. My favorite verse is John 3:16, which says, “God luvd da ppl of dis wrld so much dat he gave his only Son, so dat evry1 who has faith in him will have eternal life & neva really die.” I’m not kidding.

1. Because of the widespread use of ‘LOL’ on internet messaging and the inverse proportion of those who type LOL to those who actually do laugh out loud, I find it necessary to say that I actually did laugh out loud. ↩
2. A quick shout out to my favorite Parisian/former Waco-ite, Miss Megan Rapp. ↩

Gilead: A Novel

I finally got my hands on Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead. I’ve been itching to read the 2005 Pulitzer Prize winner for some time now, but I haven’t had the money to buy it. A couple of days ago, the one copy that the Luther library has was returned and subsequently checked out by me. I am only about a third of the way through at this point, but it is already a beautiful read.

Gilead is the story of John Ames, a pastor in Gilead, Iowa whose father and grandfather were also pastors before him. At 76 years of age, Ames is slowly dying and decides to write a series of letters to his then seven-year-old son of things he wishes to share with him but will not be around to when the boy is grown up.

The book has received universal critical acclaim, and if you’re interested, you can read some reviews here (my personal favorite), here, and here.

If I’m up to it, I’ll post my own review when I finish the novel sometime in the near future.

Damascus Avenue

Tonight Damascus Avenue made its live debut. Formerly known as the Jake Bouma Band, we played an open mic night in Marty’s Cyber Cafe at Luther College. We played two original songs: “A Nail” and “Stuck In My Heart”. The songs can be downloaded below.

Damascus Avenue is Jake Bouma (lead vocals, acoustic guitar), Mike Lang (backup vocals, bass), Luke Langholz (electric guitar), and Paul Stellmacher (drums). All members attend Luther College and also play in the on-campus student led worship band, FOCUS.

Damascus Avenue information and music downloads:

Myspace

Purevolume

Damascus Avenue apparel:

Courtesy of Zazzle.com, you can order a brand-spankin’-new Damascus Avenue t-shirt. Click this link to customize your shirt. There are many colors (ash, gold, grey, light blue, lime, natural, orange, pink, stone green, white, yellow) and sizes (Youth S through Adult 5XL) available.

Keep your eyes and ears open for future shows/recordings/shenanigans.

The Gospel

A fellow blogger, Tim Samoff, inspired by a quote from Brian McLaren (I know I’ve posted a lot about him lately… bear with me) which says, “It’s very dangerous to assume you’ve perfectly contained the gospel in your little formula.” I’m not sure from which book or article it comes, but Tim explains why the quote struck him, and I think his thoughts are profound:

I do understand that the gospel is not something that can be simply stated either… This has been my struggle, I guess. It would be so much easier if it COULD be stated! :) But as something that was in fact lived by Christ and which now must be lived by us, it can’t necessarily be written down or described… That would be a tremendously long book/discussion!

It is difficult when speaking to “moderns” (for lack of a better term) about the Gospel because of this. Things like “natural overflow” and “living God’s Word” and “being authentic disciples of Christ” just don’t seem to jibe well, you know? And coming from a place where the Gospel WAS easily describable in a couple of short bullet-points makes discussion even more frustrating—> like being in a conversation where you go in hoping to sway someone’s opinions, but you realize that you’re agreeing with their beliefs…

This is the next troubling part. Knowing that everything you learned previously is correct, just not…finished…as you may have believed before. Have you ever tried to talk to someone who agrees with everything that you say but just says it differently? To an outsider, it might sound more like a debate. But it’s not!

My current “dilemma,” if you will (it’s more of a constant flip-flop of internal wit than a dilemma), is the traditional view of the Gospel meaning the “rules” in which someone receives Christ as their Savior. An example being the critical view that some people might take toward a sermon they just heard: “Yeah, he was a good speaker, but he didn’t give a very solid Gospel message.” What does this mean, exactly?! If the speaker spoke about helping the homeless, wasn’t that a Gospel message? If the entire sermon was about learning how to love those who are different , wasn’t that a Gospel message? People think that because a speaker might not give an “altar call” (or something similar) it does not contain the “Gospel.”

…

I understand the nature of the Gospel because I have experienced it. I am beginning to know how important it is to view the Gospel as something that grows within us as individuals rather than something that we only hear (i.e., a statement) in hopes to get better at. I know that living the Gospel is the key rather than preaching it.

Right on.

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