I don't get me

So I haven't written a real blog in a long time, this has been more a portal for keeping up with my videos and such (which there are quite a few of now, 10 up on youtube as I write this). I don't know if anyone regularly checks this thing any more, especially since the more perilous aspects of my journeys would seem to be taking a break.

I may not be living in Mafia infested territory, with prostitutes chilling on my corner or cars burning outside my bedroom; but life certainly seems perilous in other ways.

It's interesting how the sights and sounds, smells and sensations wrapped up in my time in France still come back to haunt me. The smell of cigarettes now reminds me so strongly of Europe, lying in bed with my sliding door open as cars ran by and pedestrians smoked in the day, hookers puffed their long stemmed cancer sticks at night.

Things back home have been good, if not bumpy. I returned to no job and no real source of income. God's been gracious to provide a great job for me (and a not so great job I had to quit because apparently I have these things called "morals") and I'm living in an awesome house with good friends in north Spokane.

But I don't really get myself. To be somewhat poetical I feel like I'm pursuing a destination, something for which I have a Holy Discontent and for which I was made. The journey to this place, however, is only the beginning as far as I can tell; and I'm not sure if it's that open ended nature of reaching what I now see as my goal that scares the crap out of me or if I'm just overtly confused.

Probably both. I'm charged, I have to get there, it was placed in my bones to live in this place and my marrow sings whenever I approach it. But the energy by which I am propelled closer to it somehow manages to drive me further from it as well. I'm drawn to it and it is simultaneously repelled by me. I don't get it, I don't get me.

There's a great level of mystery behind it, and how it interacts with my mind. I'm content where I am, but I know I won't be forever, and even if I'm content here there's a part of me that never will be. It's a Holy Discontent, something I believe God placed in me and something I'll spend the rest of my life pursuing. Even when I get there I won't be there, I won't be finished. I'll have to explore, to search, to conquer in a way or I'll go utterly insane.

And yet it's the one thing I can't conquer but must give itself to me, and must be something God brings me into. It's cyclical, repeated, I get closer and farther; more confused then incredibly lucid.

Oh well, so it goes. I try to break the cycle and end up broken, I try to fall deeper into it and end up crushed. The beauty of Christianity is often found in it's wonderfully, if not precariously balanced paradoxes. It seems I've found myself in one of those and like an eddy in a river I'm stuck swirling around until God comes along and plucks me out.

I suppose I should be learning something while I'm here. Eddies suck, whether rafting a river or braving spiritual waters.

In the meantime I'll just make videos and music and enjoy Jesus and friends. I've been blessed with so much, I'll be grateful for it all eventually. Until then I'll just focus on Jesus and try my best to follow Him one step at a time. There are no better, more valuable, more privileged options than this.

Enjoy Marshal Cane, the greatest Action Trailer to hit the internets since cold pie.

Winding Down

Alright, so I finally have a few minutes to sit and write. Hopefully my intrawebz work long enough for me to get this uploaded. Two weeks ago my friends Mike and Simon came to visit which was nice, we visited all the local spots along the Riviera and I tried to take as many photos as I could for Mike (who sadly didn't have a camera).

We had some good talks, the weirdest of which was Simon's certainty that in the near future no one will use planes and that we'll all travel by boat. He's weird but hey, he's still cooler than crap.

To make life busier I've started my masters program at Whitworth so I'm already swamped with work there, my first paper is due on Friday. I also finished work yesterday, which was classic because 2 of my 3 classes were canceled for tests. True to form.
Sadly I didn't get to say goodbye to a few of my classes, but apparently they figured they'd take the initiative on that. I'll post their letters here for you to see, I thought they were pretty "sweet."

I hope you guys can read all this. Point is: they liked me =)Sorry for the brevity of this post, I have to go pick up my parents from the airport now which is super exciting. I can't believe my time here is almost finished, it's insane. I look forward to spending time with my folks though, it's their first time in Europe. We'll be headed to Paris in a week and then after that I'll be in Dublin, but hopefully I can get on here occasionally. Whelp... better jet. Peace!

Fears

So I started working on this blog last night because I felt like getting some thoughts down on... paper... well, you know what I mean. The point is that life has been anything but certain over the past year, and it's funny to see how I've come nearly full circle in a process that will probably continue to cycle throughout my life.

So I'm sitting at McDonald's, and I'm going to make myself sit here until I get something written out... and some old guy just stole my receipts. Uh... ok. So... that was really distracting, sorry.

Anyways, I'll try to write through my headache and the random thieves that manage to steal my precious pieces of trash.

Basically I've just been resting on a few of God's promises throughout my time here and through my life and I thought that I would share some of my struggles with whoever reads this. I'll also throw in photos from my weekend in Provence for aesthetic value.

I look at my life and there are a few key ingredients missing by the world's standards. One is having a clue as to where I'm headed or what my life will look like after the next two months. In 2 months I'll be in Dublin, spending a few last days in Europe before heading home for the summer. After that I really don't know what's up.
This winter I really wrestled with what I needed to do after the assistantship in France, where I'd live and what I'd do there. The two most prominent options were Paris and Spokane. One might think "duh" but it wasn't so simple. Film school in Paris sounds rad, but the Master of Theology program sounded great for different reasons. There were a number of things pulling on me in both directions and through it all I didn't fell God leading anywhere. I'd turn one direction and He wouldn't be there, so I'd try the other and He still wasn't there.

His peace didn't rest on me, I didn't know where He wanted me to go.
The second thing I'm missing by the world's standards is a lady. I don't know if there's a plague passing through the states or something but practically all of my friends are getting married this year. I start it off with a wedding in Spokane on May 31st followed by one in Boise June 1st, and then finish up with Dalbey's German wedding in September. And I'm still not finished because I'll be in my friend Erik's wedding in January too. What's wrong with you people?!

Now I don't know if there's anyone else out there who's been saving their first kiss for their fiancee, but this whole singleness thing can be really hard. I mean I'm hard wired to be un-single and here I am stuck in the world of ain't-got-no-one country song tragedy.
A third thing I don't have by the world's standards is stuff. I don't have money, I don't have a car (here at least), I don't have a lot of clothes and did I mention Eastern sucked my future self's wallet dry? So I'm stuffless. More importantly I'm cash free.

Thankfully, like I said, God is good to have given us promises and there are a select few upon which I've not only been resting, but with which God has been transforming my view of Him and the world in general. I'll start with my future plans.

I've been in this clueless position before. Last year I was in fact stuck between two options, debating between interning at New Community or coming to France. There were multiple factors that left me struggling for months as to which I should choose. And it didn't help that I had MONTHS to think about it. Once again, I've had an extended period of time to think and debate, to pray and wrestle.

Among many things what led to my decision to come to France was ultimately my desire to get out of Spokane. I wanted to speak French and to experience something new and exciting. It's a long story, but I went with my desire because it was the only thing that differentiated the two options from each other. God gives us the desires of our hearts, so I had to trust that it was where He wanted me, and after that I felt a great peace about my decision.

What was key in that decision, and similarly with my decision to apply to Whitworth, was God's promise in Proverbs 3:5-6 which says "trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him,and he will make your paths straight." I had to trust that if I would draw close to the Lord and walk as He did in as close of a relationship as I could manage that I would end up where I needed to be.

In fact things became so dark a few months ago and I had such a difficult time seeing where I was headed that I was really forced to put my theology into action. I had to cling to God in hopes that He was headed where I needed to go. I had no choice, I couldn't see three feet in front of me. And in the end, I've ended up with a decision and a great amount of peace. Whether or not I do the program is up in the air still, but the decision to move in that direction was the right one.
Regarding girls my time in France has been AMAZING for me. And not in the way that you (Rob) are thinking. Back in the States there's such a twisted mix of Christendom that plenty of people that don't really believe in Christ as their savior, in God's grace, still manage to call themselves Christians. This makes finding real Christians a bit more challenging, especially if you want to date one. There are other reasons, but those would lead to some intense debates so I'll leave it at that.

My time in France has been amazing for the complete lack of Christian girls. In fact, there are uncensored ads for porn on every street, and it too has been a blessing of sorts. See, every girl I meet here is almost guaranteed to be a pagan, and each one I talk or hang out with drives one single conviction deeper into my heart: I need a God-fearing woman.
I've met awesome, gorgeous, cool and funny girls with great and benevolent aspirations; but each and every one of them is missing something on a level that she cannot supplement on her own. The presence of God's Spirit, or the lack thereof is incredibly evident to me. As Dallas Willard puts it in his book Hearing God,

James, the brother of Jesus, uses the image of planting to portray the relationship of the additional life in the Spirit to our natural, fleshy life. He encourages us to "welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls" (James 1:21). After the "additional" life has been planted in us, our natural powers are not left to run their own way under or alongside the new life; they are to be channeled through and subordinated to that life from above. All are redirected to spiritual ends, appointed to higher purposes, though they remain in themselves normal human powers.

The uniqueness of each individual personality remains in the beauty and goodness of its natural life. But a holy radiance rests upon it and shines through it because it is now the temple of God, the area over which the larger and higher power of God plays. An additional, spiritual life comes through the word of God as that word possesses and redirects the energies of the natural life to promote the ends of God's kingdom.

I'm content to wait on God to find someone through whom His 'holy radiance' is shining in power. The reason these girls and the street ads for porn are a combined blessing is that the desire for a "perfect girl" or for external beauty is losing its grip. I believe that attraction is necessary, I mean if you're gonna make beautiful babies you're gonna need to want to sleep with your spouse. But for guys especially I think the challenge is that we get stuck on that external beauty and we let it rule the day and our subsequent decisions.
The Proverb (31:30) "charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised" is gaining sway in my mind. I've always 'known' this, but it's really becoming a belief, something I know and, more importantly, act upon.

In all of this I also rest on God's promise in Isaiah 49:23 that "those who trust in me will never be put to shame." I've been trusting God my whole life that if I hold out on my sexual desires and wait for the right woman to come along that all will go better for me. The world and many of my friends would disagree; I've had plenty of discussions about it both at home and abroad. But as for me I'll trust in the Lord.

Thirdly (and lastly, sorry this is so long) I'm finding contentment with what I have and who I am. God's been freeing me from my insecurities, and helping me to just have fun and be content while poor and often alone. My time in France has been one of the most isolated in my life, and my list of social activities has shrunk notably. I've met some really cool people and had a lot of fun, but overall I'm as isolated from relationships as I've ever been.
And yet I'm so stinking happy. I think relationships are necessary, and I've found some particularly good ones here, but I've also found how much fulfillment and joy comes from simply being with God. My mind returns to Him so often, and I don't even need to say or think anything in particular; we just enjoy each other's presence. He's a good God, and a great friend.

"A single day in your courts is better than a thousand anywhere else! I would rather be a gatekeeper in the house of my God than live the good life in the homes of the wicked" (Psalm 84:10).

The best part is how these verses tend to come at just the right moment, and how much they sooth my soul in hard times. God's promises are good, and He stands by them. My time in France has been anything but easy, but entirely worth it. God is so good, I'd suggest you get to know Him if you haven't managed it already.
And if you're wondering what that "other stuff" that makes Christian girls scary you can shoot me a note and I might tell you if I feel daring enough. =)

Coolest souvenir ever

If this isn't the coolest souvenir in the world I don't know what is. At least the coolest affordable souvenir ever.

I got an idea on my way to school. You see I walk by these two shops every day on my way to school that do a number of things like repair shoes, make keys, and more eye-catchingly make license plates for cars.

So for the past 5 months I've been walking by thinking "I should go in and see if I can get them to make me one..." not knowing if it's even legal. I've never seen anyone come home with a European license plate before, and in the states the closest thing you can get is the cheesy blue "Washington" plates with your first name on it in blazing white.

So I passed by, always thinking it was a great idea, never jumping on the opportunity. Until finally, I couldn't contain myself any longer. Last Thursday I went in and asked the guy if he could make one for me. The example plates were the square ones (for motorcycles and scooters) and the little rectangular ones (for SUVs apparently). The big rectangular one, the one I wanted, was nowhere to be seen.

So I went for the little rectangular one, similar to the big ones and cooler than the squares. He said he wasn't sure they could do it but he would check, took down my name, told me to come back the next day leaving me wondering what would happen. Honestly I had no idea if they'd start asking me for paperwork or proof of... car... you know.

The next day I came back by, hoping that it would work. As I walked in I looked down at the base of the counter and, to my horror, saw the big rectangular plates I wanted sitting in plain view. I freaked out, cussed under my breath, and hoped that they hadn't gone ahead and made a little one for me. The guy came out and I asked if they could do it, he said nope, they were too small.

Of course I was relieved and asked if they could make a big one, because that's what I wanted anyways. He said yep, went to the back, and came back out with my totally legit license plate.


Suck on that! Coolest idea ever, and though I'm sure someone else has done it I can honestly claim to be the first I know of. And to top things off this license plate is getting phased out as the EU switches to a unified system, so I got it just in time apparently. It's ok to be jealous, it may not even be legal.

Save Our Beards

Before we get into the comic I thought I'd share a bit of my day with you (sorry to Melissa and Asher who have heard parts of this already). I had a long day today, which was only accentuated by ridiculously long breaks in between classes. I've managed to walk for about 2.5 hours so far today, and I still have to walk home.

However two cool things happened while walking. One (while walking to school for the second time) was that I went out on the beach and skipped some rocks on the Mediterranean. That was nice. The other was Beard-Man. I figured that this was only right to share in the spirit of the comic.

Beard Man is this old guy who I've seen walking around occasionally from a distance, his gray beard distinctive because of it's length and girth, measuring at least a foot long and probably just as wide, the sucker's sweet. Today I passed him on my way to school (the first time) and said "bonjour" assuming that our beards would bond us instantly. He just looked at me funny.

Saddened, I figured my beard was truly inferior and that he knew it. However, on my way home this evening (for the second time) I passed him again, only this time he gave me a knowing nod. I'm officially awesome.

With that, we continue on to the third and final instalment of The Saga of the Beard. At least volume 1. I hope you like it. Perhaps we'll come up with new ways to waste your time soon. Be sure to read Episode 1 and Episode 2 before reading this though if you haven't already. Enjoy!

Click to see full sized

Just some comments, I should have put an "s" on "Save our beard" obviously. Also you can hardly tell but the comb is in fact stuck in my beard. Also the last panel where Noah is trimming his beard is a reference to the first comic, hopefully you remembered that. The whole thing is a bit dark, my computer's screen is a little light apparently.

As for real life, I went to Monaco for the first time last Sunday and it was really cool. I'll write more soon about that and my experience there with some pictures perhaps. I went with Justus as his 'guest speaker posse.' It was cool, and a really enjoyable 'church' experience in general. I'll be headed back there Saturday with John Mark.

Anyhoo, drop me a line if I haven't heard from you in a while. I've added a stat counter now too (you can see a link at the bottom of the page) so I can see if anyone's reading my blog. Oddly enough people are... hmm. This is odd to me because I don't read blogs. In fact the last time I checked the stats (last week) I had something like 50 different people who read my blog in the course of 6 days. Only 15 or so came back later though... apparently they were scared off. I'll share some stats with you as time goes on though, they can be pretty funny.

Apparently someone found my blog when searching google for "perilous bondage stories." The combination of words led them to my post on forgiveness in which the word "story" and "bondage" (as in to bitterness) both pop up. Interesting word choice either way. Oh, and I wanted to try messing with the ads again, didn't work last time. My writing about France overpowered the beard effort, so beards we go again.

Beards are beards when there's hair on your face in the shape of a beard. Mustaches are a part of beards, which must be trimmed, but aren't beards in and of themselves. Beard beards beardy bearded beards are beardedly beards. I like beards, so did Abraham Lincoln whose beard actually was the inspiration for him to free the slaves. Beards beard beards bearded beards beard.

Beards. Hope that changes things. Not that it will help me generate any revenue, but no one clicks on those things anyways. Have a great day and I'll beard you tomorrow!

Stuck on You

Alright, in the spirit of getting at least 5 blogs up every month I now feel the 'need' to get Episode 2 of the critically acclaimed "Saga of the Beard" live-action comic series up. Episode 3 is also ready, but you'll just have to wait for that. View Episode 1, The Key to the Beard, before reading Episode 2 if you haven't already.

Click to see full sized version

In the meantime, you may have also noticed that I went through the trouble of allowing Google to advertize the crap out of my blog. It's a lot of real-estate, so why not fill it up? I figured that the few of you who read this thing might not care if I tried to use it to make a quick buck, and so far I haven't seen a dime. Hopefully the critically acclaimed Saga of the Beard will bring in some big money, but until then, I'll just have to live off peanuts.

In the meantime I kind of want to see if I can influence the advertisements by writing a bit more about BEARDS. I like beards, beards are great, beard trimmers and beard combs among many other things are simply wonderful. If a man has a beard it's a beautiful thing. If a woman has a beard, it's kind of odd. But beards beards beards are beard beard mustache beard. With mustache beard mustache beard and trim your beard your beard is bearded there's something in your beard.

That should put up some interesting ads.

St Marguerite

Sometimes it's nice to get out of the city for a day, especially when you're headed to a place like this.

My Sunday (yesterday) was spent on an island off the coast of France with three friends going to school here in Nice. They're tourism majors (yes that's a major here) from all over France and are just fun in general. If nothing else they push my French like crazy. In fact, most of the French slang I know (if not all of it) can be attributed to these lovely ladies.

Charlie's Frogs

St Marguerite is an island right off the coast of Cannes (famous for its film festival) and is home to a huge star fort and thick forests. The fort was once used as the state prison, and was home to many including the famed man in the iron mask who stayed there for 11 years. We had to take a ferry to get there, and as you can see it had a sweet French flag on the back.

Of course I thought to myself, this would be a perfect picture to BE in! I just need to get over there and get one of the girls to take my picture as I look very French next to the flying colors. So I handed my camera off, got over there, and what happens? The stupid flag stops moving! The wind died literally as I sat down and didn't start up again until the boat was moving... I was upset at the flag...
We started with lunch on a closed dock, but were rudely interrupted by a seagull that had the guts to walk right up and snag some lunch meat from Audrie. This resulted in much screaming (from the girls) and plenty of laughter (from me). It turned into quite the debacle as the seagull stood just out of bottle's reach and would occasionally try to waddle back into theft-range.


Eventually other gulls in the watter began calling out and we were soon surrounded by a number of them. Since I hate seagulls I thought it would be funny to get their hopes up with orange rind only to watch them spit it out in disgust. As I hooked a piece or two over my head and into the water the girls watched (Melanie scolded me) as the seagulls fought over worthless scraps. It was in this moment that Gimpgull made his move, using the commotion as cover he dove in for a piece of bread, which startled all of us, terrified Audrie, and left us laughing for a while as we marveled at the bird's cunning.

Turned out he couldn't fly, thus "Gimpgull," we felt bad for him as we left and he tried to make it to our crumbs before the other birds pushed him away. The rest of the trip was far less depressing though as the fort was a-mazing.





The village on top was cool too, it looked like it was straight out of a movie scene.





We went from there on an 8km loop around the edge of the island, stopping every twenty feet in wonder over some newly discovered view. I took over 400 photos in the four hours we were there (and had to somehow choose 120 of them to post on Facebook). Remember you can see full sized versions if you click on them here.



If you want to see more photos you can click on the links on the right-hand side of the page. And for those of you waiting for The Saga of the Beard episode 2, it's ready to be posted, I just need to feel the need =)

The Key to the Beard

Here's Episode 1 of the Saga of the Beard, "The Key to the Beard." This is a comic chronicling the amazingness of Noah and my beards, consider this a series of blogs about Noah =)

Click to see full-sized!

FAQ

I figured that since I'm asked the following questions all the time I should answer them in one fell swoop. Consider yourselves FAQed!

You're in France?!?! (I get this about once a week)
Yes

Where are you and when did you get there?
I'm in Nice, France which is in the south near the Italian border, and I got here on September 21st.

Why are you there?
I'm teaching English to High School students who, as their teachers put it, are very nice.

When do you come back?
Mid-May, perhaps May 8th perhaps May 15th. I haven't figured it all out yet.

Why are you in France?
*sigh*

Do women over there shave?
I've only seen two hairy women and one (I'm pretty sure) was a German hippie.

Do they use deodorant?
I've actually figured this one out. I'm pretty sure most French folks use deodorant. However I've discovered that it does little-to-nothing to hinder BO. Thus the answer is yes, but unless they're wearing obscene amounts of cologne you won't be able to tell.

Do the French hate Americans?
No, but they do hate you.

What's your favorite thing about France?
Pain au chocolat, it's a pastry with chocolate in it. Delicious.

Are you fluent in French?
Depends on what you call fluent; I can have good long conversations but I won't be trading stocks any time soon.

Are you having fun?
Most of the time, yes I am. How could I not? But sometimes people get a bit too drunk and drunk company is usually poor company. Especially when you're always sober.

Do you miss home?
Is the Pope Catholic?

What do you miss about home?
Pizza Pipeline, hands down. But in close second would be family and friends. I miss New Community and my cronies at EWU a ton. I had no idea how much I loved them until I couldn't be with them.

What time is it there?
Now? 12:15am, but to figure it out just add 9 hours to your time (if you're on Pacific time). If not... well, I guess you can do the math.

Why France?
I don't know.

No seriously.
Really! I don't know. I've always wanted to come here for some reason; it's just best described as a tugging on my heart. Thus, I started learning the language in high school and never really stopped.

I'll try to update this occasionally, it seems like those questions get asked a lot. There are others, but I'll just leave it like that for now. Feel free to ask more =)

Christmas in Grasse

So yes, despite the many attempts on my life made by various groups of bandits and ninja pirates, I did in fact survive Christmas and even got to spend it with some cool people. Christmas is a great time to spend with family, and though I missed out on that aspect I did get to hang out with some awesome people and experience a traditional French Christmas with a French family.

Vincent and Nichole are a married couple working with Justus and CA here in the south of France. Vincent (or Vinny) is a true Frenchman born in Orange, while his lovely (and quite pregnant) wife Nichole is as Scottish as they get. Well, actually I'm not sure about that, but her accent is amazing. Combined they make a great couple, Vinny wearing his Christmas kilt made my night.

Vinny's family was there as well, his parents speaking absolutely no English and his sister kind enough to speak a little with me, made for a very French Christmas. To top it off we had Foie Gras, duck liver turned pate (and they kill the duck by over-feeding it during the course of two weeks). That, the foie gras, and the live oysters made it quite memorable. The liver spread was good, the oysters I'll try to avoid in the future. But spending all day at the table isn't a bad Christmas tradition no matter what you eat.


It was a great time, I absolutely loved it there. Their house is practically a mansion, three stories with a swimming pool, crazy huge for a guy who's spent the last three months in tiny Euro-apartments. It was just nice to relax outside of Nice and to crash/watch movies for a few days. I'll add pictures but you can look at more now if you want by clicking on the link under "photo albums" on the right.

And sorry this blog's kind of cliche, here I did and where I did it blog blah blah; I'm getting kind of bored with the regular re-counting of events. I'll have to come up with something more creative in the future. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Alternate Profile

Jaymus Bartholomus Swansonimonimus was born in the year of our Lord 1985 in Pullman, Washington under the sign "Caution, Volatile Chemicals." He later shortened his name in 1992 to Jay Swanson, so as to avoid capture by the Nazi party based out of Northern Idaho. Many dispute the validity of this story, mainly because they’re Nazis.

Jay Swanson has been reported to have moved recently to Nice, France causing the value of the dollar to plummet. He is recorded in the Encyclopedia Britannica as being the most handsome and eligible bachelor in the World as of 1998. But don’t bother trying to verify that in the Encyclopedia, the Nazi’s paid a good amount of money to slander Jay’s name and have it removed from all Encyclopedias.
Damn Nazis.

Next time

OK, so I know I promised a blog about Noah but that will have to wait. My neighbor Solweig was particularly offended that I hadn’t written a blog about her, so here goes. Oh, and remember if you want more pictures to check out the links to "Photo Albums" on the right.

Solweig (pronounced sol – vegg) is my little blonde French neighbor who is majoring in tourism at the university here in Nice. She’s 23, from a small town near Avignon, and claims I’m the first Christian she’s ever known. That said, she’s the first French girl with a non-French name I’ve known. So I guess that makes us even.

Aside from hanging out and watching movies, Solweig and I are masters of brochures. She had a project for one of her classes wherein she had to make a “prospectus” (a.k.a. brochure) for a local hotel with pictures and everything. Being the nice guy that I am, I ended up doing all of the work.

We went to a cool little place called Hôtel Windsor, and though it sounds British I assure you, it’s quite French. The rooms are cool because each has been painted uniquely by a different artist at one point or another in the past. So we got a nice tour of the place, checked out a bunch of rooms, and then made the prospectus.

This room was radtacular

It turned out. I guess she got an A+ on it (I’m that good in French too I suppose) but I’m still waiting for the thank you dinner to happen. It got cancelled due to her friend’s illness… or something like that. I suppose I’ll survive; I’ll just keep eating pasta.

And that’s about it on Solweig. And gents, she’s quite single as well =)

I'll get photos up as soon as the internet stops hating me.

Slacker

I realized that each month I've been here the number of posts on my blog has dropped progressively by one, and I was going to try to rectify that this month. Looks like I'm on the route to failure on that.

I also realized I've posted fewer pictures, so I was hoping to change that too (as people prefer pretty pictures to rambling rants). But instead of posting tons of pictures I posted links to my albums on facebook on the right side of my blog. You can click on them and check out my photos even if you don't have a facebook account. I was going to at least post a few, but I'm having serious internet problems so if there aren't any pictures in this when you read it just click on the albums on Facebook for now.

I've had a number of trips and met some cool people, and I'm not sure really what to write about. But I did visit John Mark in Antibes, along with his loverly room mates...

I'll tell you a little about two guys who are progressively enriching my life, how about that? I met John Mark, a tall baseball player from Tennessee, when I was getting my medical exam with the other assistants in Nice. Turned out he was a Christian and was looking for a church, and thusthat relationship was started .

The other is Justus (of whom I have yet to get a photo, he's illusive), a church planter with CA here near Nice in a town called Sophia-Antipolis. He's a great guy as well who I got hooked up with through Rob and his connections with CA.

We've been doing a little weekly Bible study that's turned more and more into a discussion hour, and it's been really good. Reading large chunks of scripture together every week and then talking about it, praying together... it's been great.

Jon Mark is the current champion of the group, however, as he had a recent hunting experience quite unlike any he'd ever had in America. And he's an accomplished hunter.


After boar hunting (yes, boar hunting), the French family that took him out went after birds and ended up shooting a bunch of small, sparrow-like creatures. They brought them home, plucked the feathers off, and threw them in the oven.

They then proceeded to sit down and eat the entire bird. They weren't like pheasants, or ducks, they were seriously little bitty birds and there were three to a plate. And when I say entire bird, I mean entire bird. JM said he was a bit shocked because they didn't just pull off the meat (the breast of the bird being about the size of his thumbnail), they bit straight in. He knew he was in for it when the dad just took a bird and bit its head off, chewed the skull up nicely, and swallowed.

What he'd gotten himself into he wasn't sure, but the manly man that he is he proceeded to eat the birds set before him. He wondered why no one was eating the toast on the table when suddenly the guy next to him cracked a bird's rib cage open, scooped out the entrails, and spread them on the toast like jam.

And so JM did the same and choked all it down. John Mark Walls is a true southern hero. And he's quite single ladies ;)

And that'll do for today. I'll try to get more on the internets here as soon as I can. And don't forget to click on the links to photo albums on facebook if you're in the mood for some French photos.