Hey what do you all think of my new header. I dezigned it myself with a little help from Josh. It's very X Filish looking wouldn't you say. I like it. I want to try my hand at a few more dezigns so this will probably be temporary.

We have our lock-in tonight. I am looking forward to it. It's always a blast to hang out with all of the students. I don't know if I can hang with staying up all night though, we will have to see. Well, I am definately going to go get some coffe and keep it brewing all night. Haha! So I am out to get some nectar of the Gods...Starbizzucks...Kudos to Juan Valdez!

Man, sometimes I hate to read the news. I read some news articles on the earthquake that hit over in Asia on Sunday. That is such a tragedy. It totally blew me away. The death toll is up to 44,000 and rising in 11 countries. I don't even really know how to react to this. This is the biggest tragedy that I have witnessed in my lifetime. It is the largest Tsunami an over 120 years and it is the largest earthquake ever registered. I was too young to be effected by our 58,000 lost in Vietnam. I know this did not happen in America but it sucks to watch people suffer. This is such an awesome opportunity to glorify God in the face of such horrible conditions. I think that this is a time for the American people to step up. Think about it. We are so blessed in this country. Even some of the poorest people can at least go to food pantries and get food. I think that the American people should step up and help out in this time of need. The government sent over disaster teams and are planning on giving $15 million to help out. That is like $1 when you look at the overall damage and the lives and families that have been so voilently torn apart. It hurts me inside to think about it. This should be a time when America can show that we are not apathetic to things that go on in other countries. We can make so much more of a difference than the government ever could. I don't know, it's just something to think about. I would hope that peopl would do the same if America was in the same situation. It's wierd, I just watched Day After Tomoorow the other day and Then this happened. That is freaky. One day you are thinking, nothing like that could ever happen. Now, Im like well I guess something like that could happen. I'm glad I know where I will rest if I were to die.

Man this snow storm is nasty. Not the worst one that I have seen, but it is still alot of snow. You have to figure that I am 32 so I remember the blizzard of 1978. We lived in a mobile home and it got buried. We were there for 3 days before the National Guard dug us out. That was nuts. Also, when I lived up in Maine, it snowed like this all of the time. But their salt trucks were used to dealing with that amount of snow. I'm getting ready to go home in a few minutes. I think that I will just rent a video game and a couple of movies and lock myself in the house.

O.k, now I have seen everything. This thing is supposed to let you know what your dog is trying to say to you. The Bowlingual Dog Translator analyzes your dog's bark and then it translates it to you. You know, so your dog can be more annoying than he/she already is. Now, not only are they bugging you with their bark, but you can have conversations and arguments with them. Now they can come into your room and tell you that they peed all over the floor. Then you will praise them for being so smart. "Hey Billy, I just chewed up your brand new G.I Goe with the kung fu grip...isn't that cool. It tasted great...like chicken." Sometimes I think that man DID come from apes.

We had our AE staff Christmas party Saturday...Good times. I got an awesome white elephant gift. Props to Aaron on his gift that he made also. That was awesome! We stuffed ourselves with good food and two kinds of corn caserole. Yummy! Not to mention the fondue..druel...druel. Thanks Allen for the Dr. Fu Manchu DVDs. I have already watched some of them. Sunday night we went to the Springfield Youth Network service at the YMCA. I had a great time hanging out with everyone. I think this one was better than the last one that we had. I think that thaving it at the Y was a great idea. I hope it grows and more students can come to it. We had about 120 students there. Then we went back to our house and ate some wings. I LOVE JENNIFER"S HOT WINGS! There is something about hot wings and good company, they just go together. Luke, Courtney and I stayed up and watched Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. Great Movie! That was pretty much my weekend.

Here is another article on the shooting of Darrell Abbott. This Guy that shot him seemed to be whacked in the head.

Former guitarist of the band Pantera was shot and killed last night when a man jumped up on stage and began shooting at new band that he was in called Damage Plan. He then turned to the crowd and fired some shots at them. The shooting occured at a night club called the Alrosa Villa that has been having metal bands play there for years. Damage Plan was put together by Darrell Abbot and his brother Vinney after Pantera split up. "Dimebag" Darrell was known as one of the greatest guitarists in the genre of thrash metal. He was someone that I grew up listening to in the late 80's earlier 90's. The only one in my opinion that was as good as him was a guy by the name of Alex Scholnick from a band called Testament. Not quite the kind of music that I listen to these days but it was stuff that I grew up on. It's tragic that someone would do something like that. Of course, I don't know the whole story. Maybe Darrell did something to this guy and he was getting even or something. You just never know what is going through people's brains sometimes. You can check out one of the articles on the shooting at 103.9 The X. I'm going to have to follow this for a bit and see what info turns up. This is the biggest news in music since Lane Staley from Alice In Chains died.

Josh found this online game yesterday called "guess the dictator". It's a game where you think of a dictator or a sitcom character and it starts asking you questions so it can guess the character. We could only stump it a few times. We were getting so mad at this thing. It was funny. I'd come into the office and Josh would be trying to beat it. Then he would get mad because it would figure out who it was. We were pulling out some obscure characters like certain snorks and old TV characters. Very addicting. Go to
Guess the Dictator I guarentee you will be addicted.

I read an article today about a new system that Bose made called the "personalized amplification system". This concept kind of blows my mind. I guess growing up in a world of garage bands and basement parties It kind of seems too simple. I read up on it and am impressed with the theory of it. Yet I am very skeptical. I guess the term "too good to be true" comes to mind. I mean, for a gig to sound good you have to break your back hauling in the equipment...right? Anyway, this system is supposed to eliminate the need for a sound board, amplifiers, monitors, and everything else associated with "electrifying" a band. I don't know about that. There is a local band in Columbus that uses this system. I think I am going to have to go and check them out soon because this is going to bug me until I hear the results for myself. If you are a musician and are interested, go to Bose Personal Amplification System I would love to here what this sounds like live.