10.25.2004

Hooray for Man United!!!!!

something really great (and sort of monumental.....at least in the near past) happened yesterday...... Manchester United beat Arsenal yesterday 2-0. now, i'm sure a collective yawn from all of my American readers just accurred, but this really is pretty cool for two reasons: 1. Arsenal has been top dog in the Premiere League for nearly 2 years now and have trounsed everybody they've played in the last season and a half, to beat tham is cool, but to beat them without them scoring any goals is simply great and 2. by Man United beating Arsenal yesterday, it ends Arsenal's 49 game winning streak.....yeah, they've won (well, apart from the yesterday) the last 49 games they have played in the normal season; a lot of people were pissed because it stopped them just short of attaining 50 undefeated matches in a row....oh well.

things here are going really well, busy of course, but well. the guy i work directly with, Sam Hargreaves, is gone all this week on holiday, so its sort of me on my own this week. i assumed the responsibility of overseeing two of the worship services yesterday and making sure they ran smoothly (which they did, thank you Jesus) and i have to oversee how the music/video goes tonight at Alpha. so, it'll be a lot of responsibility, but the awesome thing is is that i get to cut my work week short by a day as i am taking off with some friends thursday morning to spend a long weekend in Wales. Alice, a friend of mine here, has a family cabin in the east part of Wales, so we'll be staying there for free. we'll get there thur. evening and come back saturday afternoon and just chill and do some hiking whilst we are there. this will be my first opportunity to get out of the city and see the countryside...i can't wait, it'll be freakin awesome. i'll be taking lots of pictures, so check my online photo gallery next week and there will be many award winning photos there for all of you to enjoy. love/miss you all.

10.12.2004

stupid bus driver...

well, its 8.30 in the morning and i've already been here at the church for two hours now. every other tuesday i have to arrive at the church at 6.30 and set up breakfast for the early morning prayer group which starts at 7. so, every other monday night i dread the thought of having to get up the next morning at 5.15 so i can have time to get ready and make it to the bus stop on time (which i always do). well, this morning was no different, i woke up bright eyed and......ok, i woke up like a slightly coherent zombie and managed to get dressed. the bus comes at 6.01, so i left the house and was there at 5.50, nice and early. it was a really grey, windy, and slightly rainy day, so i didn't really enjoy waiting for the bus. well, as the 255 usually is, it was late and at about 6.07 it finally came chugging around the corner. i stepped to the curb and waved my hand out to him (the common gesture used to let the bus driver know that you want him/her to stop and pick you up) to let him know that its his bus i need to take. well, instead of pulling over and letting me on, he kept freakin' going....i couldn't believe it. not only was he late, but he just kept going and didin't stop; what a jerk, he had to have seen me waving my arms like i was giving landing directions to a plane. so, i had to walk to work, but the bright side to it all is that the wind died down and it was a really pleasant walk; and i found my way to the church alright (i was a little worried 'cause i've never walked that way). i did loose my temper a little, i'm ashamed to say, and i may have murmered that he was an a-hole. oh well, it turned out ok, i was to work just a couple of minutes late, but i got everything done in time.

i'm excited about this saturday as we are having a Creative Arts Day Away (its not really away though...its here at the church). it'll be a really cool time of creative worship and hanging out with people on the creative arts and worship teams. i'm excited to see how this day will inspire people to use their creativity more in their worship and prayer to God. ---->also, Primal Scream and Spiritualized are going to be at the Brixton Academy (only a 10 minute bus ride from here) saturday night, so it appears that i will be going to that with Dave (the other ministry assistant) and possibly a caouple of others; it'll be so sweet dude. well, i hope all of you have a good week. take care.

10.04.2004

what a great weekend

hello all, as you may have gathered from the subject line of this post, i had a really good weekend (mainly saturday). first off, Sam Hargreaves and i were able to go to Resfest on saturday, which was at the National Film Theatre on the South Bank. we got there about 1 hour and 1/2 early so we would have time to just walk around, but when we got to the theatre where they were showing the one we wanted to see (Shynola rarities), a woman asked us if we were there to see the panel discussion "Commissioned Films and Creative Briefs", "why yes we are, thanks," was our reply, so we went in. it turned out to be a really great discussion about commercial/corporate funding of film and if it can be done without compromising artistic freedom. there was a rep. from Getty Images who talked about the project they sponsored called "The Big Idea", in which 6 film makers were comissioned to make short films primarily using material from the Getty Images web site; they set out to show what was possible through the use of their images/video clips. There was a rep. from the ad agency used by Diesel clothing who talked about the "Diesel Dreams" project in which 26 film makers were sent pictures of models wearing Diesel clothing (as well as the clothing worn by the models) and they were comissioned to make a short film that was their interprtation of the dream the model was having. The brief for this was incredibly open, the film maker didn't even have to use the clothing in the picture, thus steering clear of turning it into a commercial. One of the film makers for the Diesel Dreams project, London-based Tundra, was there also and showed their film. however, the coolest thing about it was that Doug Pray, director of Scratch, was there and talked about his Dr. Marten's-sponsered collection of 6 short films featuring average workers from the London area. the criteria for the subjects was that they must exhibit passion and drive in their work, whatever it was. it was cool to hear how much freedom he was given and how much Dr. Marten's didn't want the films to be commercials, even to the point where Doug had included a shot in one of the films of the person's shoes (which happened to be Dr. Marten's, and the creative rep from the company told Doug to take it out because it was too blatant of a plug.

after that, we went to the see the selection we were most excited about, Shynola Rarities. for those of you've never heard of Shynola they are a design group mainly specializing in animated media (check out their web site by clicking on their highlighted name above). they have done projects/videos for the likes of Radiohead (the Kid A blips, "Pyramid Song" video), Junior Senior ("M-Move your Feet" video), UNKLE ("Guns Blazing" video), etc. anyway, the session was a reel of tons of their work and some rarities that they hand-picked to be shown.....it was 2 and 1/2 hours long and freakin' awesome. when that was done, Sam and i took off and walked along the South Bank (south bank of the River Thames), it was simply awesome walking along the river, enjoying all the beautiful buildings on the other side. we stopped off at a nice little pub/restaraunt and had a late lunch right on the river...quite nice. after that we went to the Tate Modern, which was just a 10 minute walk from the NFT. they didn't have any featured exhibits, but we went to their permanent holdings galleries, which were totally worth the free admission :). among the artists we saw were Salvador Dali, Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollack, Henri Matisse, and Mark Rothko; it was really cool. after that, we walked across the "Wobbly Bridge" as it has come to be effectionately known to the other side of the Thames and right there in front of us was St. Peter's Cathedral; wow. so, there you go, i can finally say i've been to central London (which some people see as the real London) and if any of you lovely people come out here to see me, i will be able to be a somewhat effective tour guide.

one other exciting point about this weekend is that i made my first video for the church here and it was shown last night at the 6.30 service. it turned out to be more of an installation as i set up a make-shift screen for it, had two huge candle holders in on the front sides of the screen, and had a Sasha Cd playing for mood music. it was pretty cool to see that finished product, even though it was hectic and tough setting it up. anyway, i felt like i had finally made my first real contribution to the worship here.....i love that feeling. well, i suppose i've used up enough work time writing this, so i suppose i should get back to work.