God-Wrestler

The Noticer
By: Andy Andrews

I saw the description for this book and decided to give it a go. I have never read anything by Andy Andrews before and I have never heard him speak before. I knew nothing about his writing, his life, or why this book was getting so much hype. So I sat down at work and began to read this book. (I was allowed to read all I wanted at work since I was a night auditor at a hotel.) Before I knew it I was completely wrapped up in this wonderful story.

Every page turned added new insight to my life and kept me wanting to know more about the way one man could make such a big difference just by paying attention to those around him. The Noticer takes you through lives of people touched and changed in the most radical, yet simple, way I have ever heard of. An old man giving new perspective an advice by simply breaking people’s lives down to the basics. He takes out the complicated mess and provides a birds eye view.

This book, The Noticer, by Andy Andrews will entertain you and keep you wanting more. Then it will make you sit back and take a new perspective on your life all by looking at it in a simple way. It’s a short and fast read that will not leave you disappointed.

Andy Andrews has also launched a project based off this new book, The Noticer Project. This project encourages you to reach out to the 5 most influential people in your life. It’s not asking you to present a grand gesture to these people but in some way thank them for how they have influenced you. You can find more about the project here http://www.thenoticerproject.com/.

You can buy The Noticer by: Andy Andrews here.

On Twitter follow @AndyAndrews, @NoticerProject, and @Clyderandall

Every year we have a scavenger hunt and do all sorts of shenanigans. This year we had six teams and loads of fun even though it was wet and raining. Here are some highlight videos from each team.

Mary’s team won this year.

Here is some of what you missed if you didn’t make it to Chicago with us last weekend.

Kyle leap frogging everything.

Snapshots.

I have a really bad headache right now and it just will not go away. I think its because I have worked so many days straight. Even though my job consists of me sitting here doing nothing its still very draining. Only two more nights and I will be done here at the Forest Park Suites.

I ordered new shoes. They are being delivered today. I am very excited because its been since October of 2007 that I got new shoes.

My dog, Marty, had a seizure last night and my Dad and I got really freaked out. Marty is our long haired chihuahua and he’s not the brightest dog but hes the cutest lil thing ever. He is so sweet and loving. I just love it when he lays in my lap and that he tries to play with the big dogs. We tried to take him to our animal clinic which is supposed to be a 24 hour place. When we got there around 10pm there was no one there and Marty was still breathing really hard and shaking really bad. I guess they aren’t 24 hour when the next day is Easter. By the time we got back home Marty was doing better but we’re still worried bout him. The interweb says that chihuahua’s are prone to seizures. So I guess I have an epileptic dog.  

Here’s Marty McFly chillaxin with my Dad.

Sorry if i have some bad grammar here, my head really hurts right now.

Lark Ascending
by: George Meredith

He rises and begins to round,
He drops the silver chain of sound,
Of many links without a break,
In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake,
All intervolved and spreading wide,
Like water-dimples down a tide
Where ripple ripple overcurls
And eddy into eddy whirls;
A press of hurried notes that run
So fleet they scarce are more than one,
Yet changeingly the trills repeat
And linger ringing while they fleet,
Sweet to the quick o’ the ear, and dear
To her beyond the handmaid ear,
Who sits beside our inner springs,
Too often dry for this he brings,
Which seems the very jet of earth
At sight of sun, her music’s mirth,
As up he wings the spiral stair,
A song of light, and pierces air
With fountain ardour, fountain play,
To reach the shining tops of day,
And drink in everything discerned
An ecstasy to music turned,
Impelled by what his happy bill
Disperses; drinking, showering still,
Unthinking save that he may give
His voice the outlet, there to live
Renewed in endless notes of glee,
So thirsty of his voice is he,
For all to hear and all to know
That he is joy, awake, aglow;
The tumult of the heart to hear
Through pureness filtered crystal-clear,
And know the pleasure sprinkled bright
By simple singing of delight;
Shrill, irreflective, unrestrained,
Rapt, ringing, on the jet sustained
Without a break, without a fall,
Sweet-silvery, sheer lyrical,
Perennial, quavering up the chord
Like myriad dews of sunny sward
That trembling into fulness shine,
And sparkle dropping argentine;
Such wooing as the ear receives
From zephyr caught in choric leaves
Of aspens when their chattering net
Is flushed to white with shivers wet;
And such the water-spirit’s chime
On mountain heights in morning’s prime,
Too freshly sweet to seem excess,
Too animate to need a stress;
But wider over many heads
The starry voice ascending spreads,
Awakening, as it waxes thin,
The best in us to him akin;
And every face to watch him raised,
Puts on the light of children praised;
So rich our human pleasure ripes
When sweetness on sincereness pipes,
Though nought be promised from the seas,
But only a soft-ruffling breeze
Sweep glittering on a still content,
Serenity in ravishment
For singing till his heaven fills,
‘Tis love of earth that he instils,
And ever winging up and up,
Our valley is his golden cup,
And he the wine which overflows
To lift us with him as he goes:
The woods and brooks, the sheep and kine,
He is, the hills, the human line,
The meadows green, the fallows brown,
The dreams of labour in the town;
He sings the sap, the quickened veins;
The wedding song of sun and rains
He is, the dance of children, thanks
Of sowers, shout of primrose-banks,
And eye of violets while they breathe;
All these the circling song will wreathe,
And you shall hear the herb and tree,
The better heart of men shall see,
Shall feel celestially, as long
As you crave nothing save the song.
Was never voice of ours could say
Our inmost in the sweetest way,
Like yonder voice aloft, and link
All hearers in the song they drink.
Our wisdom speaks from failing blood,
Our passion is too full in flood,
We want the key of his wild note
Of truthful in a tuneful throat;
The song seraphically free
Of taint of personality,
So pure that it salutes the suns
The voice of one for millions,
In whom the millions rejoice
For giving their one spirit voice.
Yet men have we, whom we revere,
Now names, and men still housing here,
Whose lives, by many a battle-dint
Defaced, and grinding wheels on flint,
Yield substance, though they sing not, sweet
For song our highest heaven to greet:
Whom heavenly singing gives us new,
Enspheres them brilliant in our blue,
From firmest base to farthest leap,
Because their love of Earth is deep,
And they are warriors in accord
With life to serve, and, pass reward,
So touching purest and so heard
In the brain’s reflex of yon bird:
Wherefore their soul in me, or mine,
Through self-forgetfulness divine,
In them, that song aloft maintains,
To fill the sky and thrill the plains
With showerings drawn from human stores,
As he to silence nearer soars,
Extends the world at wings and dome,
More spacious making more our home,
Till lost on his aerial rings
In light, and then the fancy sings.

Coffee has become such a cultural icon for today. If your successful, prosperous, well liked, or cool you drink coffee. A long time ago coffee was a drink for the ordinary man. The man who worked hard, played hard, and needed a cheap pick me up to get up in the morning. Now coffee is found in corner boutique like shops and you spend as much for a cup of coffee as you used to for a pound.

People have become coffee snobs. A cup of joe is just not good enough anymore. I spent a month working the office for a Young Life camp and had the responsibility of being the town runner. My job was to fulfill the needs of the camp and campers by running errands in town for them. Our camp medic would have me make a special trip in a different part of town to get him this special locally grown coffee. Starbucks coffee from Walmart wasn’t even good enough for him. Why? Now I understand that coffee has degrees of quality to it but seriously.

You have your;

• 1 Filter Coffee
• 2 Espresso
• 3 Coffee with milk
• 4 Cafe mocha
• 5 Cappuccino
• 6 Frappuccino
• 7 Mochasippi
• 8 Cortado
• 9 Macchiato
• 10 Affogato
• 11 Liqueur coffee
• 12 Cafe Americano
• 13 Flat white
• 14 Galão
• 15 Greek frappé coffee
• 16 Indian filter coffee
• 17 Yuanyang
• 18 Ca phe sua da
• 19 Iced coffee
• 20 Instant coffee

On top of all of these different types people spend immense amounts of time adding to their coffee so its just right. You got to add your sugar/sweetener, cream or milk. Then its one pack or five packs and has to be stirred so many times. There are also the people who want their coffee fresh but then add ice because its too hot. Is the drink really worth all this work?

What happened that coffee became this fad? Now maybe I’m biased because I don’t drink coffee, but I missed the days where a plain old cup of joe was acceptable. As for me, just give me a nice refreshing Coca-Cola for my caffeine fix.