• My good friend Megan Rapp is blogging her experience in a one-week intensive seminary class in Philadelphia called “Community Development and Ministry”. She has already posted notes from the first lecture, and more are sure to follow. I am more than a little jealous. 09/24/2006
• Red-Letter Christians, whose name comes from the color of Jesus’ words in some Bibles, has launched a new grassroots political campaign. “The purpose of this gathering… [is] not to create a religious left movement to challenge the religious right, but to jump-start a religious movement that will transcend partisan politics.” More here. (thx, John) 09/19/2006
• According to his website, Damien Rice’s new album entitled ‘9′ will be released later this year. I’m going to go call all of my Eskimo friends. 09/19/2006

Survivor fever

The 13th season of Survivor, the reality show that began the reality TV craze, began last Thursday night. I used to watch every season, but the last full season I watched was Survivor: Pearl Islands (Season 7). I went to New York in 2002 with a choir from my high school and I still have a t-shirt I bought at the CBS store with the Suvivor: Australian Outback (Season 2) logo on it.

This season takes place in the Cook Islands, and the most astonishing thing is that the four tribes are divided by race: Asian-American, Latino, African-American, and Caucasian. In an interview on CBS’ Early Show, host Jeff Probst said that Survivor itself is “a social experiment. And this is adding another layer to that experiment.”

Brandon has watched every season and always has a contest to pick the eventual winner. If it’s not too late, I would like to submit Yul as my entry.

Because I watched the first episode, I have committed myself to watching the entire season. It’s a good thing 24 doesn’t air during the same time of year, or I wouldn’t know what to do with myself.

• The new iTunes 7, which I mentioned in the previous post, has a myriad of new features. Here is a helpful walkthrough of those features so you don’t miss any. Update: Here’s a roundup of the other new features as well. 09/12/2006

Music of the month

John Mayer, Continuum: It is well known that I am a huge Mayer fan, but this record is simply phenomenal. I’ve been listening to it for a while since he DJed the whole thing on a radio station (and it was promtly recorded and made available for download) and it refuses to get old. Whatever your preconceived notions of John Mayer are (read: Your Body is a Wonderland, Daughters), throw them out and give this record a chance. Favorite tracks: Slow Dancing In A Burning Room, Stop This Train

Under the Influence of Giants, Under the Influence of Giants: I’ve tried to describe this album to several people, and the best I have come up with is, “If Maroon 5, the Beatles, the Darkness and some dance beats got together and decided to make some music, this album would happen.” Put simply, it’s fun music. Favorite tracks: Got Nothing, Meaningless Love

Snow Patrol, Eyes Open: That I didn’t know about this band earlier makes me feel a little silly. I love the way many of the songs start small and then build and build. Who am I kidding? I love it all. It’s also a great driving album. Favorite tracks: You’re All I Have, Chasing Cars, Shut Your Eyes

José González, Veneer: I owe a big “thank you” to Brandon for tipping me off to this guy. The first song I heard actually isn’t on this album; it’s an acoustic cover of Kylie Minogue’s “Hand on Your Heart” that is heart-melting (link to video). José was born in Sweden to Argentinian parents, and this album is the perfect soundtrack for the fall. Here is an interview he did on NPR’s All Things Considered. Favorite tracks: Lovestain, Crosses

This Day & Age, The Bell and the Hammer: I first saw these guys opening for Mae in July 2005. They blew me away then and I promptly bought their first album, Always Leave the Ground. This new album is one hundred times better than their debut, to the point where it almost sounds like a completely new band. Visit their MySpace page and listen to “Second Star to the Right…”, it’s already made the top 25 most played in my iTunes. Favorite tracks: Second Star to the Right…, Always Straight Ahead

In other news, if you haven’t yet downloaded the new iTunes 7, you should probably do that.

• John Mayer’s new album, Continuum, is released today, and the MSM discussion board has an amazing interview with him. “I wrote the lyrics to ‘Try!’ in a [expletive] dressing room at the Filmore and taped them on the monitor that night. I ate grilled salmon in my hotel room with the lights out and wrote ‘Good Love is on the Way’ in Microsoft Word because I had to. That’s the coolest [expletive] in the world!” 09/12/2006
• eBible, an awesome web 2.0 Bible search tool is now open to the public. I’ve been a member since it was in beta and I highly recommend it. 09/08/2006

Confession of a closet gamer

Pictured at right is Final Fantasy XII Collector’s Edition for the PlayStation2 console, to be released October 31. Let me explain.

When I was younger, my older brother had a copy of Final Fantasy III for Super Nintendo.¹ I watched him play it for a while and decided to start my own game and was hooked instantly. I logged nearly 50 hours in the game, making sure I uncovered every secret, found every weapon, and defeated every boss. I think I actually played the game twice through. What I didn’t know was I had taken the initial step in becoming a Final Fantasy junkie.

In 1997 the next installment in the series, Final Fantasy VII², was released for the original PlayStation console. I pre-ordered the game from a game store in the local mall and received a FFVII t-shirt featuring the main character, Cloud Strife (and his huge sword), on the front for doing so. I don’t know when I lost that shirt, but it was a sad day. I have such fond memories of this game; I easily logged more than 100 hours. Myself and many others contend to this day that Final Fantasy VII is the greatest game ever made. I mean, I actually cried when Aeris died.

Fast forward. I played Final Fantasy VIII and IX³ for the original PlayStation and Final Fantasy X for PlayStation2. I could say much about every one of these wonderful games, but I won’t. Final Fantasy XI was an online-only game, and because I didn’t want to pay the monthly fee, I never bought it.

And here we are. The soon-to-be-released Final Fantasy XII is the first “regular” game in the series to be released since 2001. I sold my PS2 a while ago, but I have already told my brother that I’ll be taking his for a month or three to log some serious hours in this secret obsession of mine.

1. Although it was actually the sixth game in the Final Fantasy series, it was only the third to be released in the US. ↩
2. See above. ↩
3. The main character of this game, Zidane Tribal, is one of my favorite characters in the series. At one point, my AOL screen name was something like zidane_tribal36. ↩

The return of the scruff

I shaved for the last time for a while this past weekend.

Last year I participated in No Shave November and ended up with a pretty sweet beard. I started growing the scruff at the end of September, so I am getting a head start this time around. I just have to make it past the awkward inbetween stage where it just looks like I am lazy and/or homeless.

I believe this picture was taken early last December, just before I shaved. If nothing else, this year’s Christmastime w/Jake & Tom pictures will be even better.

• Northern Iowa could have one of the nation’s largest wind farms by 2008. Iowa Winds LLC wants to build a 200- to 300-megawatt farm covering about 40,000 acres in Franklin County. 09/01/2006

Fall semester

In honor of the first day of class, here is a list of the courses in which I am enrolled. What you won’t see on here is my senior paper, which I’m not sure if I am going to do this semester since my paper adviser accepted a position in Scotland during the summer.

• PCAP 450: Journalism, Law & Ethics: Using a case study approach, students will be exposed to specific areas of communication law and ethics. This course will acquaint students with aspects of the American legal system related to journalism and the mass media, and will instill in students an appreciation for the underpinnings of American democracy as expressed in the law. Further, ethical questions journalists must face at the edges of the law will be explored.
• GRK 201: Intermediate Greek: A review of ancient Greek grammar, vocabulary, and syntax, followed by readings in both the New Testament and classical authors.
• REL 364: Buddhism: This course introduces the historical, textual, and doctrinal foundations of Buddhism as well as contemporary issues raised by Engaged (socially active) Buddhism and by the feminist study of Buddhism. The course will focus on the analysis of excerpts from the Pali canon and selected Mahayana Sutras. Time will be devoted to the historical development of Buddhism as well as contemporary forms of Buddhism in South and East Asia. Particular emphasis will be given to the basic Buddhist ideas and their implications for rituals, ethics, and the life of the communities. In addition, the course will explore the expression of these ideas in self-cultivation practices, popular piety, ethicalsystems, and the social agenda of selected Buddhist schools today.
• REL 239: Prophets and Prophecy: This course will examine prophetic literature in the Bible, in particular Isaiah, Jeremiah, Joel, Amos, Exekiel and Hosea. Through group discussion students will practice reading and understanding biblical texts with an emphasis on their historical and literary contexts. Textual material from extra-biblical sources will also be studied. The main focus will be on understanding the prophets in their own time. There will, however, also be discussion about the contemporary relevance of these texts.

• You can now preview John Mayer’s new album, Continuum, in its entirety. I’ve already listened several times and might just go ahead and say it is his best album yet. 08/24/2006

Five quotes

I came across this meme over at kottke.org.

You go to this website and look through random quotes until you find five that you think reflect who you are or what you believe. Here are mine:

“The universal brotherhood of man is our most precious possession.” (Mark Twain)

“When you give each other everything, it becomes an even trade. Each wins all.” (Lois McMaster Bujold, A Civil Campaign, 1999)

“Therefore search and see if there is not some place where you may invest your humanity.” (Albert Schweitzer)

“The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.” (Samuel Johnson)

“To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best day and night to make you like everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight and never stop fighting.” (e e cummings)

• In an email home, my older brother used a word I haven’t seen before: nonplussed. “At a loss, puzzled, filled with bewilderment.” I’ll add it to my vocabulary. 08/23/2006

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