The Monday brief

December 15th, 2008 | Comments (3) |

The Monday Brief

Highlight of the week: Last Tuesday afternoon, I joined an impromptu meetup with Brandon, Brandon, and Ryan at Caribou Coffee. It was a wonderful break from the beginning of what was a stressful week.

Book(s) I’m reading: In halfway through two books right now: In Search of Ancient Ireland: The Origins of the Irish from Neolithic Times to the Coming of the English, and Booking Passage: We Irish and Americans by Thomas Lynch (the latter which I got at the suggestion of Mike Stavlund). The back cover of Booking Passage calls it “part memoir, part cultural study,” but there’s something about Lynch’s writing that transcends the categories of memoir and/or cultural study. It’s about life, and it’s written beautifully (Lynch is a poet, after all). Take this, for example:

Today, the easier communications become, the easier it becomes not to communicate. The more rapidly we travel to the ends of the earth, the more readily we avoid our nearest neighbors. The more communing we do, the more elusive a sense of community seems. We are each encouraged to make individual choices, to seek personal saviors, singular experiences, our own particular truth. We make enemies of strangers and strangers of friends and wonder why we feel alone in the world. (xxxix)

So good.

Music I’m digging: I haven’t been listening to any new music, really. The majority of my music-listening time has been spent finding recordings and arrangements of Christmas songs to do with the praise team at St. Mark.

Something(s) that blew my mind: “Recently, researchers at the Bradley Hasbro Children’s Research Center in Rhode Island suggested that anal sex is on the rise among teens and young adults, particularly those who have unprotected vaginal sex.” Is anal sex covered in public schooling curriculum? Youth ministry curriculum? Looks like it should be. Read the article: Study Reports Anal Sex on Rise Among Teens: Lack of Sex Education, Virginity Pledges, Ignorance Contribute to Risky Behavior.

Ministry update: We had the high school Christmas party last night and it was tons of fun — good food, good games, and good white elephant gifts. I took the opportunity at the part to hand out these pencils that say “Jesus loves you snow much.” ‘Tis the season! The junior high Christmas party is this Wednesday night.

Seminary/ordination update: Nothing to report, but in Booking Passage, Lynch describes ordination as becoming “lieutenant in the standing army that wages war on sin and evil and the flesh.”1 Perfect.

Looking forward to: Reading and planning the Ireland trip itinerary.

That’s it for the Monday brief. Feel free to leave a comment, and if you’re feeling extra frisky, check out the Monday brief archives.

  1. Lynch, Thomas. Booking Passage. New York: W. W. Norton, 2006. 89. ↩
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Little Drummer Boy

December 11th, 2008 | Comments (4) |

I had to add another page to the new edition of the quarterly youth ministry newsletter today, because the powers that be didn’t like an odd-number page count — apparently it threw the entire newsletter out of whack.

Anyway, to fill up the new page I wrote a mini-message about the lyrics of one of my favorite Christmas songs, “Little Drummer Boy,” and you can find it below. Enjoy.

It’s no secret that I love music. There is a certain power in music — something that extends beyond the reach of the senses to touch us deep in our souls. When it is the vessel for lyrics, music transforms once static words, and truth becomes communicated in a dynamic and extraordinary way.

Now, I love this about all music, but I think there is something particularly special about Christmas music and the way in which it imparts so many profound and timeless truths about Christ’s breaking into our broken world.

The song “Little Drummer Boy” has been a perennial favorite Christmas song of mine. There are lots of things that I love about the song, like the subtle march-style drum beat or the “pa rum-pum-pum”s, but it is the lyrics that truly draw me in. Have you ever really contemplated the lyrics of “Little Drummer Boy”?

The story of the song, told from the perspective of a little boy on the night in which Jesus was born, begins like this: “‘Come!’, they told me. ‘A new born King to see! Our finest gifts we bring to lay before the King, so to honor Him when we come’.” Those instructing him to come see the baby Jesus are likely proudly displaying their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh — none of which the boy has, nor could he afford anyway. With nothing extravagant to offer as a gift, the boy decides to go anyway.

Standing beside the manger, the boy musters the courage to speak: “Little baby,” he says to Jesus, “I am a poor boy, too. I have no gift to bring that’s fit to give the King. Shall I play for you on my drum?”

This boy gets it. Here he stands, at the side of the promised Messiah, knowing full well the significance of the event unfolding before his eyes. Yet he also recognizes that there is something peculiar about the situation. Playing the role of amateur detective, the boy surveys his surroundings and deduces that the Christ-child is not simply wrapped in swaddling cloths, he is wrapped in humility.

Upon the realization that the ultimate gift from God has come in utmost humility, the Little Drummer Boy reciprocates, and although he wishes he had precious gifts to offer, he offers his own humble gift: Playing his drum.

The story concludes with the ox and lamb grooving to the boy’s drum beat (I love that), and after he plays his absolute best, the baby Jesus looks up at the boy and smiles. In his smile, the Messiah says, “Thank you, little boy. The gift you have brought me is better than all of the gold, frankincense, and myrrh in all the earth.”

Martin Luther once said, “God created the world out of nothing, and so long as we are nothing, He can make something out of us.” When we humble ourselves before Christ and offer the best of ourselves, however simple, God smiles.

May we reflect on these lyrics and come to find ourselves wrapped in humility this Advent season. ✛

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The Monday brief: Ireland edition

December 8th, 2008 | Comments (12) |

The Monday Brief

Highlight of the week: As the title implies, I’m taking a vacation to Ireland! My friend Kelly and I are flying out of Chicago on December 31, celebrating New Years over the Atlantic, landing in Dublin on the 1st, and then spending the next week traveling around southern Ireland. Naturally, I am SUPER excited about it. I’ve always had a fascination with Ireland and it’s been at the top of my “must see” list since I can remember. And now it’s reality (we leave in 22 days, but who’s counting?). Right know I’m trying to connect with any Irish bloggers, and/or Twitterers, and/or Christians… if you know any, please leave a comment or e-mail me. Also, please comment or contact me if you’ve been there and know of places that we absolutely can’t miss.

Book(s) I’m reading: Once we had the flights booked, I ordered three books: Rick Steve’s Ireland 2009 travel guide, In Search of Ancient Ireland: The Origins of the Irish from Neolithic Times to the Coming of the English, and St. Patrick of Ireland: A Biography by Phillip Freeman, my college Greek professor. I’m about 50 pages into In Search of Ancient Ireland, and hope to have that book and St. Patrick of Ireland read in the next couple of weeks. Hopefully reading them will make the trip both more interesting and more educational.

Music I’m digging: At the suggestion of Scott Lenger, I downloaded The Start of It EP by Meese (link opens in iTunes) and it’s fantastic. If you like The Fray, you’ll like Meese. The fact that the EP only has 4 songs just makes me want whatever they put out next even more. I also downloaded Mermaids by Slow Runner. I heard the song “Make You Love Me” a while back, and have wanted to download Mermaids since… I finally got around to it. Everyone who reads this blog should emulate Scott and suggest good music to me. Kthx.

Something(s) that blew my mind: Today I installed the Pano app (link opens in iTunes) on my iPhone, which, as the website says, “lets you take beautiful, seamless panoramic photos straight from your phone, no other software necessary.” It is sweet. On my first try, I took a sweet panoramic picture at Qdoba. I’ll definitely be using Pano in Ireland.

Ministry update: We’re busy preparing for a bunch of things: a Service of Remembrance on Thursday (for anybody who has lost loved ones), the Eikon Christmas Party, a spontaneous Parent’s Night Out on the 19th (it wasn’t on the calendar until last week), and Christmas Eve. Lots on my plate before Christmas! Oh, and here’s the promo video I mentioned last week:

Seminary/ordination update: I’ve been having an ongoing conversation with my Senior Pastor about the best way to move forward. Stay tuned (but don’t hold your breath).

Looking forward to: I would say Ireland, but that’s not coming up this week, so I’ll say I’m looking forward to ringing a bell for the Salvation Army this coming Saturday night. I just hope it isn’t freezing.

That’s it for the Monday brief. Feel free to leave a comment, and if you’re feeling extra frisky, check out the Monday brief archives.

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Interview with Mike Crawford (Part 2)

December 4th, 2008 | Comments (4) |

Songs from Jacob's Well case

The following is Part 2 (Part 1) of an interview with Mike Crawford about his album Mike Crawford and his Secret Siblings present Songs from Jacob’s Well, Volumes I & II: Even the Darkness Will Not Be Dark To You. You can read my review of the album here. Mike is the Worship/Arts Pastor at Jacob’s Well, an emerging church in Kansas City, MO. For more information about Jacob’s Well, visit their website or check out this article from the Christian Century.

For the record, all hyperlinks in this interview were provided by Mike, not myself.

JAKE BOUMA: Is the sound on the album the same sound the worshipers hear on Sundays? What’s standard setup of musicians for a “regular” worship service?

MIKE CRAWFORD: I would say the sound on the album is a bit heavier or edgier than what people would hear on a Sunday. The album is also probably more intricate in a “parts” sort of way. We took the time to hone in on specific parts for the album, whereas on Sundays it’s really more free-flowing. Sundays are definitely more improv, as opposed to the record, which is all very meticulously arranged.

It took me a year to record all the parts with everyone that was involved. It was a great process though. I’d send the musician into the tracking room and have them play along with my basic tracks, just doing what they do on a Sunday. Then we’d both sit and listen to the playback and find the really great parts and follow where they were leading, sometimes with me singing parts to the musicians to help get their parts mapped out, and sometimes with me jumping around to create some energy or excitement or laughter. I especially love the laughter on the record.

We have around 40 people on the worship team. The band is different every week, which keeps the music really fresh. The most common setup is bass, drum kit, electric guitar, piano, female singer and me on acoustic and electric. Sometimes we have violin, sometimes trumpet, sometimes flute. We usually have just one “auxiliary” melody instrument per week. Sometimes the pianists will play glockenspiel too, which I love. We also do more acoustic weeks with dobro, acoustic guitars, banjo, mandolin, upright bass, hand percussion, fiddle.

JAKE: When we spoke in person, you told a story about CCLI rejecting one of your songs. Could you tell that story again, while elaborating on the Scriptural basis for much of the lyrics on “Songs from Jacob’s Well”?

MIKE: When I submitted the song The Magnificat, CCLI told me I couldn’t register the song because it was straight from scripture, and that Zondervan or someone had the rights to those words. I didn’t argue the point, but we’ve continued to sing the song and to record the song. The words are so powerful how they are laid out, I just wanted to sing them straight from scripture… Hopefully Mary won’t sue us…

I do access scripture a ton when writing worship music. I just think singing those hymns and psalms that the early church might have sung is a powerful thing. Several of the songs from the record are like this, which I think is why people connect with them. It’s certainly why I connect with them. It also keeps me out of too much doctrinal trouble if I’m staying really close to what the Bible is saying.

One of my favorite “scripture songs” on the record is Horse and Rider. I got this song after reading Walter Brueggemann’s book The Prophetic Imagination. In it, he talks about the first worship song in scripture as being Miriam and Moses’ song after the crossing of the Red Sea (Exodus 15). In one powerful chapter, he paints with painstaking beauty an utterly free God, controlled by nothing, whose character and task is to release the oppressed… release them from an oppressive royal regime that has co-opted and domesticated its gods to control and oppress and support the affluence of the status quo. To then re-read that passage from Exodus 15 in his context (God vs. status quo of empire) made me think, “We really need to be singing things like this.” When we do, we are singing theology. I love how Brueggemann explains the line from verse 18, “The Lord will reign forever and ever”: He says that implicit in that line are the words “…and not Pharoah…” The Lord will reign forever and ever… and not Pharoah! So when when we’re singing “Lord You will reign, Lord You will reign… forever, forever, forever, amen,” it really feels like we’re singing so much more than just “God is so good, He’s so good to me…”

JAKE: Everyone I asked from Jacob’s Well said the best song on the album — if they had to choose just one — is Words to Build A Life On. Admittedly, it’s a favorite of mine. What’s the story behind the song? How did it come to be? Does it have special significance to you?

MIKE: Ah yes, Words To Build A Life On… that song. That song is an enigma to me. I love it and am artistically frustrated by it. It seems to have a life of it’s own. It travels around the country and sends emails to me from places I’ve never been or seen. It tells me of all the people who relate to it and who cry the first time they hear it. It really is a strange one! I also know it will be nearly impossible for me to write another song that impacts people the way that one does, so it frustrates me a bit.

Seriously, I don’t know that I had too much to do with that song. It sprang from a sermon Tim was giving where he was talking about the beatitudes and he wrapped up the message by quoting the very end of the Sermon on the Mount. He was using Eugene Peterson’s translation (The Message) and it reads, “These words I speak to you are not incidental additions to your life, homeowner improvements to your standard of living. They are foundational words, words to build a life on.” I thought to myself, “That sounds like a song if I’ve ever heard a song.”

So I was up in my office the next week singing the chorus, asking God how he could make His words “mine”, how I could incorporate them into my life. Then I started singing the beatitudes and adding things that seemed counter intuitive to how we, as people, feel “blessed”. A woman named Deanne Pearson was our administrator at that time and she was in the office next to me. She came to my door and said, “What’s that song you’re singing?” I said, “I don’t know, I’m just messing around with a new one.” She said, “Well, you should keep doing whatever you’re doing, because I’m over in my office crying listening to you.” I guess that was the beginning of the tears… Thanks Deanne for encouraging me to continue on.

I just continued to write and write, piling up words like I was a Bob Dylan impersonator or something. It became very unwieldy — much too long for a proper song. Anyway, we didn’t sing it at church for a long while because I wanted to edit it down, get it to a more manageable length, something that made more sense. A friend of Tim’s, Jason Clark, came to speak at Jacob’s Well one Sunday. We had two services at that time. After the morning gathering, based on his sermon, I knew we had to sing “Words” that night. I didn’t really have time to edit it, so we just sang all the words. The rest, as they say, is history, at least it’s Jacob’s Well history. That song seems to really be important for our community. I’m just glad to have had the time to be in my office dinking around on my guitar when it came.

Stay tuned for part three of the Mike Crawford interview… it’ll be right here on JakeBouma.com in the next several days!

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The Pledge of Allegiance

December 1st, 2008 | Comments (13) |

American flag

This past weekend, the pastor who helped get the phrase “under God” inserted into the Pledge of Allegiance, The Rev. George M. Docherty, died. According to this AP article,

Docherty delivered a sermon saying the pledge should acknowledge God in 1952 at Washington’s New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, just blocks from the White House.

On Feb. 7, 1954, he delivered it again after learning that President Dwight Eisenhower would be at the church.

Congress inserted the words a few months later.

Additionally, Rassmussen just released a report saying that 77% of U.S. voters believe school children should say the Pledge of Allegiance every morning at school. Of those surveyed, 82% say that “under God” should remain in the Pledge, even though it’s use, the report says, “has been challenged in the courts in recent years.”

Personally, I don’t really have any beef with the Pledge of Allegiance, but I DO think that “under God” should be removed. Apparently I’m in the minority. Now, I’m no Constitutional scholar, but “under God” has no business in a pledge of patriotism to the United States.

Why? Because it blatantly ignores the religious plurality that exists in the United States — a plurality which shapes its very nature. Even though lots of reports overwhelmingly declare a majority of Americans believe in God (between 80 and 95 percent), there are plenty of people who fall in the 5 to 20 percent who don’t believe in God (which is at least 15 million people, and as much as 60 million). Furthermore, to which “God” is the Pledge referring? Is it the God of Judaism? Christianity? Mormonism? Islam? Most people probably assume that “under God” is indeed referring to the God found in the Bible of Christianity (it was advocated by a Christian pastor, after all), and that’s just fine by them.

But here’s the thing: There is no such thing as a “Christian” nation. In fact, the United States — as a cultural and political force — is in many ways an embodiment of the very sort of entity Jesus (and Paul) was trying to subvert. That the United States is the richest nation does not mean it is specially “blessed” by God. It is the poor who are blessed, remember?

In the end, I’m with David Waters:

It isn’t our belief in God that makes us different. It’s our belief in the liberties (religious and other) enshrined in the Constitution. The American creed is faith in liberty for all, not the religion of most.

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The Monday brief

December 1st, 2008 | Comments (1) |

The Monday Brief

Highlight of the week: I spent the better part of Saturday afternoon making a video with a couple of my high school students. We shot scenes in Valley West Mall, Barnes & Noble, Border’s, and back at church. I have it done — for the most part — but it’s not uploaded anywhere yet. It was a pretty fun time working on it, and I had a good time discovering all of the free music bundled with iMovie. Oh, and this was pretty funny, too.

Book(s) I’m reading: I put Downtown Owl on hold last week and read Malcom Gladwell’s new book, Outliers: The Story of Success. I love all of Gladwell’s stuff, and I found this book to be particularly engrossing — it was essentially Freakonomics-style thinking applied to our notions of how one becomes successful. Highly recommended,

Music I’m digging: I’ve been enjoying Copia (link opens in iTunes) by Eluvium this past week, based on John’s suggestion. Aside from a couple of beautiful solo piano tracks, Copia is rich ambient goodness.

Something(s) that blew my mind: Outliers.

Ministry update: Nothing new, really.

Seminary/ordination update: I’m currently maintaining a holding pattern regarding seminary and ordination.

Looking forward to: Planning and researching a potential vacation…

That’s it for the Monday brief. Feel free to leave a comment, and if you’re feeling extra frisky, check out the Monday brief archives.

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Interview with Mike Crawford (Part 1)

November 28th, 2008 | Comments (3) |

Songs from Jacob's Well case

The following is Part 1 (Part 2) of an interview with Mike Crawford about his album Mike Crawford and his Secret Siblings present Songs from Jacob’s Well, Volumes I & II: Even the Darkness Will Not Be Dark To You. You can read my review of the album here. Mike is the Worship/Arts Pastor at Jacob’s Well, an emerging church in Kansas City, MO. For more information about Jacob’s Well, visit their website or check out this article from the Christian Century.

For the record, all hyperlinks in this interview were provided by Mike, not myself.

JAKE BOUMA: First, thank you for agreeing to this interview. Let’s begin by getting to know you a bit. How did you get into music?

MIKE CRAWFORD: I got into music pretty early. It was probably a combination of a few things that culminated in my playing guitar. My parents were really into Texas Blues… they used to have friends over every Friday night to play dominos, drink wine and then dance till midnight to the “three Kings” — Freddie, Albert & B.B. In addition to my parents’ blues influence, I became obsessed with Elvis the year he died. I had just turned 10 that year. Somehow I got completely obsessed with his music and then all other late 50’s/early 60’s music. My parents took me to a Chuck Berry concert that fall and we sat in the front row — and that was “it” for me; somehow something clicked that night, I knew I had to play guitar. I saved up my allowance and bought an old Silvertone acoustic at a pawn shop and went to the library and got a Mel Bay book of chords. I proceeded to teach myself to play. After a year of persistence, my parents gave me a year or two of guitar lessons.

My sixth grade year, my Aunt Donna gave me The Beatles “White Album” and I was done for again. I fully entered the world of music — most of it through her and my uncle’s record collection — Jimi Hendrix, Van Morrison, The Beatles, Captain Beefheart & his Magic Band, Elvis Costello, Devo, Tom Petty, B-52s… they were hippies who were also into new wave! Oh yeah, the first “album” I bought was KISS’ Alive II… I joined the KISS army in 5th grade… it was all happening around that period for me… 10, 11, 12. I joined my first “band” in 7th grade — we were called Savage! I have played in some sort of band (mostly) ever since then. I played in a band called The Spin at Baylor University in the late 80’s and then ended up touring the country with that band for 3 years after college.

JAKE: So how did you get involved with Jacob’s Well?

MIKE: After that college/post-college phase, I really didn’t play too much music for about seven years. I entered a “desert” period during my late 20’s — doing a job I didn’t enjoy (computer programming) and not really playing much music. I had been living in Kansas City for a couple of years and was discipling a group of guys. Most of them were part of the core group that helped launch Jacob’s Well. They would always bug me about leading worship at Jacob’s, but I was pretty involved at another church, and honestly, had never led worship before. After singing at one of those guy’s wedding, I met Tim Keel. We struck up a fast friendship and a year later I found myself unemployed and seeking a new direction in life. Tim told me he and a few others had been praying for 6 months about asking me to lead worship at Jacob’s Well on a part-time basis. I had been praying for about 7 years for God to move me out of the corporate world and into a vocation involving “music and ministry”. I had no idea what that would be. I also talked to Tim about some ideas I had about starting a recording studio. I also told him about a new band I had formed called Builder. We talked at great length about the reality of the shifts into post-modernity, a new thinking of missional living, a new way of thinking of evangelism, a new way of thinking about lot’s of things! We decided pretty quickly to try to incorporate all of this (worship leading, studio, rock band playing in the local scene) into a full-time position at the church.

We ended up, with the grace of God’s help, fundraising a big chunk of my salary and all the funds necessary to begin work on building and equipping a recording studio. At that time, I was 34 years old, married, with two kids and a third on the way. It really didn’t make much sense to many people as a realistic career move. I mean, most worship leaders are in their twenties and don’t need much to survive. This was going to have to be something very different. I think the church was about 75 people strong when I started. It was definitely a stretch and a risk, both on my part and on the church’s part. I’m so thankful that it’s ended up working out. I can’t think of a better job!

JAKE: “Songs from Jacob’s Well” is unlike any other worship music on the market today. How would you describe the sound of the album? What kind of sound were you aiming to create?

MIKE: I knew I wanted to create something that sounded different than the “Nashville-machine” music that dominates most worship records. Even the best worship records tend to have a sound that is same-ish. I’m not saying those records sound “bad”, in fact most of them have great sounds — huge drums, giant guitars, amazing vocal sounds. They just sort of strike me as being on the dull side.

The music that moves me is more creative, earthy, noisy, old or even more grandiose than what I’d experienced when listening to worship music. I wanted to make a record that I enjoyed listening to.

My reference points for the album were The Beatles’ White Album and Sigor Ros’ takk record. Those records are quite different, but both have elements that really draw me in as a listener. They are also both quite layered and a bit experimental. I also really love jazz and classical music, and I knew I wanted some elements of those types of music melded in, too. In addition, I listen to lots of field recordings or found-sound kinds of recordings. Some of the work of a guitarist named Steve Tibbets has these elements, also a collective called Set Fire To Flames use these kinds of recording techniques. Brian Eno is also a big influence, especially his ambient recordings – Discreet Music, Thursday Afternoon, those kinds of things. Talk Talk’s The Spirit of Eden is another huge touchstone for me, although the JW cd doesn’t sound anything like that record. Another thing that has influenced me over the past few years is the music of Iceland, especially Sigur Ros and múm.

Click here to continue to Part 2 of the interview »

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The Monday brief

November 24th, 2008 | Comments (6) |

The Monday Brief

Highlight of the week: I played a show for the first time in about six months last Friday night, and it was a blast. Lots of good friends were there at Mars Cafe, and it was a great atmosphere. I debuted a new song called “On Hold” and even played a cover of Leona Lewis’ “Bleeding Love”, complete with a stock drum machine loop. Thanks to everyone who came out!

Book(s) I’m reading: Still reading Downtown Owl.

Music I’m digging: I downloaded The Silver City (link opens in iTunes) by Jeremy Messersmith and listened to it a few times, but I don’t like it as much as I’d hoped.

Something(s) that blew my mind: I went to an Otolaryngologist (a.k.a. ENT, a.k.a. Ear, Nose, and Throat doctor) today figure out what’s really been wrong with my throat (I went to a walk-in clinic last week and the 30 seconds the doctor spent with me didn’t exactly lead to a precise diagnosis). Anyway, I had a long metal tube with a camera in it put down my throat, and I got to see the video that was taken, which was mind-blowingly weird. I agree with the nurse who, before inserting the camera in my throat, said, “It’s not exactly the prettiest part of the human body.” The diagnosis: I have an ulcer on my right lingual tonsil. Here’s the picture to prove it.

Ministry update: Not a whole lot new to report this week. I’m planning on making a video this weekend with some high school students to promote next spring’s auction. The premise? The search for a calendar of kittens wearing fedoras.

Seminary/ordination update: I was not accepted to Luther Seminary. I’m currently having conversations with some people close to me, discussing different options.

Looking forward to: A relaxing, post-Thanksgiving weekend.

That’s it for the Monday brief. Feel free to leave a comment, and if you’re feeling extra frisky, check out the Monday brief archives.

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