The aspiring vet

Here on the farm, one of the tasks we have in the Springtime is giving our animals shots so they do not get diseases and taking care of the babies. Taking care of is a euphemism for removing the extra part of the lamb's tail that gets in the way and covered with dung and removing the testicles of the boys. My daughter has mentioned that she wants to be a vet when she grows up and she is just great with the animals. So today she was given the opportunity to band a tail and give the shot to the lamb. She performed the task without a problem! A little poop on the back end of the critter didn't faze her in the least and rooting around in it's armpit looking for the proper spot to inject into went well too. Maybe I do have a future vet in the family!

The Combine

Here at the South end of Utah County, they take their baseball seriously. Oh, sure, kindergarten through second grade you sign up, everybody plays and hits and gets a chance to field, but once you hit the third grade, play time is over. They get serious in the third grade and I had the opportunity to experience that last night. There were well over 200 kids at the combine last night. They checked in, were all given numbers, then they had the opportunity to sit and wait for their turn. When their batch of kids came up (they ran 12 at a time) they would first throw back and forth to each other while the coaches evaluated their skill and whether they could throw straight and catch the ball. Then they lined up at one end of the gym and raced to the other in the 40-yard-dash equivalent. At the other side of the gym, they all grabbed a ball and one at a time, threw it to the other side to show their arm strength. Then they all had 5 attempts to hit the ball from the pitching machine. All the while, there are coaches sitting in the stands scouting these kids and the guy in charge is calling out names and numbers over the speaker system in the place. It was truly an amazing sight! All these 9-year-olds doing their best to make a good impression in the 10 minutes they had to show off their skill. Well, my boy made it through the combine and we're looking for the call tonight as to what team he's on.

It worked!

I realize that to a lot of people the computer really is a black box that you need to keep closed and safe or the smoke will come out and it will stop working. They look at nerds such as myself as arcane keepers of knowledge that are passed down with bizarre rituals that involve the speaking in acronyms and much nodding over numbers. Frankly, half the time the dumb thing doesn't do what I want it to either! I was very amazed last night that it worked on the first try. I have been doing a musical chairs with computers at RCC recently. Our finance computer broke down and the motherboard on the laptop is just too spendy to buy, so we got a new laptop. But we don't care about the finance computer very much since it sits most of the time, so the new laptop was given to Pastor Dean, all his stuff moved over and then we waited for a while. Just to make sure everything worked properly. That took about a week of some pain, but now he's functional and all is good. So I removed the brain from his laptop, put in the finance laptop and it worked! Yep, first try and everything. Of course, that is what it is supposed to do, but dang if it actually works out that way for me ever! So I'm amazed!

Starting the day

How does your day begin?

I think this is an important aspect of how our day will go...how it starts. If the day starts with a 90-minute commute through bumper-to-bumper traffic you arrive ready to do battle and fight and take on whatever challenge you are presented with today. On the other hand a 10-15 minute drive through the country to climb into the cab of a tractor has a different feel to it, it probably preps the dirt farmer well for a day plowing or discing or cultivating.

I was thinking about this because I choose how my day will start. Sometimes, when I'm running behind, I'll bomb on over to the freeway, put the pedal down and get to Provo from Benjamin just as fast as the Little Green Wart will move! That doesn't always give me the best day at work, but I do hit the ground running when I get here. Today I didn't. Today I took the fun way to work. It's the back roads off 3200 West out in my world. I get to go by pastures that are starting to green up...herds of cows with their calves on their sides. And today I saw in a really green pasture a lone male pheasant just walking along looking for breakfast. It starts my day differently than the freeway run. A bit more introspective maybe, but certainly I do better with solving some of the unique problems I am presented with after a run through the fun way.

Humor

If you are overwhelmed with nerdishness this week on the blog...well, it's the week for it! This is BrainShare week for Novell and I usually go into a drooling nerd haze for some of the neat things we have available this week. One of the items I have enjoyed tremendously is the take on the I'm a Mac, I'm a PC commercials. Novell spoofed them for this week and has three of them with Linux involved. Now I did run these by my wife to make sure this didn't only appear to nerds, so here's the first...

Where Linux is introduced. This second spoof is on the latest releases the products are making. Microsoft's latest Windows offering is Vista and the latest in the Mac OS world is Leopard. All my wife had to say about this video was that I needed to find Linux's jacket because she wants one!

And here's the third installment. It's making fun of the fact that Linux runs on all the hardware...not just a certain type of hardware like Apple, but anything!

Meet the Geek

So I find myself in SLC again for the annual meet the expert night. Once again, the food is wonderful! The teriyaki beef is delicious and the sushi is pretty good. I'm off to find another sparkling water.

I yam what I yam

as Popeye would say and it boils down to me being a bit of a nerd/geek/computer weasel...whatever you want to call me. This year for our annual conference, my company put together a few more marketing videos found here http://www.novell.com/video/ and I have found them to be very funny! Now I first checked with my wife to see if normal people would find Mac PC Linux and Geek My SLED funny as well and it's debatable, but hey, it's my blog and I can put them out there! If you enjoyed them or not, lemme know.

Living life on pause

I've been on pause for a while. Since ~February 2005 I've been in pain and that has caused me to put a ton of stuff on pause. Getting some blogs and messages online has been a part of getting my life playing along again. There's a lot more, though. My relationship with my wife and family has also been on hold and we've been working on that as well. This year we'll be able to put in a decent garden because we're no longer on pause. I was able to get some work done on biodiesel over the last couple of night and I'm working on my career again. Whew! We're getting things going now! Pay attention here for the latest announcements of stuff that will be coming along and made available.

Where'd it go?

Well, I have been behind. I mean really behind on updating Dean's blog and the message with the latest stuff. I finally have the wiring complete and it's...disappointing. It's just not very much stuff out there. I know I ripped more than that but I can't find it. Now I'll have to work with the library and see if I can't fill in some of these blanks!

Remember the Sabbath...

So one of the Ten Commandments is for us to remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. That was done by taking a day of rest. I know a lot of folk have Saturday as the day to work around the house and Sunday is the day of rest with some church, maybe some TV or playing with the family in the afternoon, then the day is done. That's not an option for me. Oh, I'm not saying that I'm so important that without me the church won't run. I've taken days off and everything runs fine! What I'm saying is somebody has to do the church work, and I feel called by God do perform this function. So Sundays start around 0515 for me to wake up to get to church and set stuff up and be able to talk to people before church starts. Yesterday after that was done, there were some critical computer stuff that needed to be worked on so I finally laid down in bed at 2315. Not exactly a day of rest for me. Saturday works for a lot of folk, and that's what I think of as my Sabbath. I do farm and work the animals and work in the garden, but I'm not sure work is the right word for it. After all my work as a software engineer at Novell during the week and my pastoral work with the church during the week, being able to dirty my hands on Saturday is very relaxing to me. My kids enjoy it as well and we all have some fun talking about God while we work. We talk a lot about stewardship and how we need to not just let our land go to weed because that's not being a good steward. We talk about how we need to feed and water the animals so we are good stewards of them. But I'm not sure that is the same as taking a Sabbath. What are you doing to have a Sabbath?

Mr. Mom

I hate this. I really just don't like having to do my wife's job. Her job is hard! Maybe it is our different personalities or our gender, but I do not enjoy being the stay-at-home anything. My wife certainly wasn't sure about it when she quit her job of 8 years in 2001 but she has truly found her gifting. The patience required to get three kids moving in the morning and the schedules on where each needs to be and what they need when they arrive and feeding the things! They're like a horde of locusts eating all in their path and leaving giants crumbs and wrappers behind! Just cleaning up their dishes is horrible. My eldest the other morning decided to take his morning applesauce that comes in a single serving cup and put it into a coffee cup that needs to be washed. And you must understand, that was my very first day! So I don't like it at all, I am not jealous, I am happy to go to my various jobs and accomplish taasks there. Well, I'm laying here doing a lot of not sleeping tonight and I got to thinking about joking with my wife years and years ago that if we ever had children she'd still have to work to live in our house. What an arrogant butt I was! These are my children. They are super important to me and the number one thing I can give them to help them grow up well-adjusted and productive members or our world is a father that values his wife. And valuing her enough that she stays at home raising them is a biggie. My wife has the opportunity to be there with the first scab and the first lost tooth and when somebody got a cut. Sometimes I'm jealous she gets the firsts, but that is just one of the perks of her job. One of the artists on my iPod is Gretchen Wilson and she says it all in her song Full Time Job

I'm a mother
I'm a lover
A chef, a referee
I'm a doctor and a chauffeur
Seven days a week
I ain't askin' for a medal
Yeah I know you work too
I just like a little credit
Where credit is due
It's the hardest gig I've known

I've changed. I no longer poke fun at my wife for her work. No, it's not even that easy. I don't just not poke fun at her but I really get agitated with some folk. They'll ask me what I do for a living normally with a

"What do you do, Mr. Buckley?"

And I answer that, but I'm watching. The next question out of their mouth could make it or break it for them...lots of times these are salesmen. So pay attention, you salespeople out there, you treat my wife with respect and you still have me on the end of the hook, but you come back with a

"Do you work, Mrs. Buckley?"

you can just pack it in right there because we are done. Oh, stick around because I will begin the lecture about how my wife works harder than either of us do since 13-hour days pretty much don't sound like fun to me. If they really got under my skin, we could get into what her worth is as all the careers listed in Gretchen's song, but my wife wins just on hours alone! I am working 40 hours a week for the year with right around three or four weeks off a year because of holidays and sicknesses and vacations...ooh, don't get me started on does my wife work!

Ugh

Okay, I'm a wuss. I'll freely admit that. When I get a cold I will cry like a baby until it goes away. But this thing I got...whew! It even took my wife out and nothing puts her down! So you first need to know a bit about my daily schedule. After I get home from work, around 1730, I remove my back brace.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh

and lay down in bed for a while. This is known to the entire family as resting my back. So the other night I was laying in bed resting when my daughter came in and informed me that I stink. Well, I hadn't been doing anything to cause a stink and it's not like I sweat at work...it's 68 degrees where I work and on a rough day, my fingers are sore! So my wife came in after her and confirmed that I had a bit of an odor about me. I showered to remove that odor and the next morning I realized what it was...The Illness. Yep, it is all capitalized. I was completely kicked in the rear Wed when I woke up. My temperature was through the roof, I was slightly delirious and just getting out of bed required so much muscle power I wasn't sure it would work. So Wed was just uncomfortable. I hurt all over (including the back) and I couldn't think straight. Heck, it was so much effort to pick up my laptop and since I couldn't think I didn't even check email. For those of you who know me, you realize this was an apocalyptic moment...I'm always on email! Now it gets worse. Wed night to Thurs morning I sweated profusely. We're not talking teaspoons here, but rather changing my shirt three times during the night, changing my covers and pillow! ICK! But thankfully that was the fever breaking. Thurs was spent in bed, but thankfully I was able to check email and fix food for the kids. I'm hoping Fri will even be better, but wow what a kick in the rear this sickness was!

TANSTAAFL

That is a well-known EEEEEETLA (extra, enhanced, extended, expanded, exceeded, extraordinary three letter acronym) in geek circles. Heinlein had it in one of his sci-fi books. It stands for

There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

And it is so true for so many things. Yesterday, what seemed like a nice gentleman came to the door while I was at work and wanted to clean a carpet in our home to show my wife what a great job they do cleaning carpets. My wife drilled the guy about what he wanted and came to the conclusion he was selling carpet cleaning. Well, we've been in the house about three years now and with the dirt and mud and ick and filth out in Benjamin it is about time for a carpet cleaning anyway, so she figured she'd see how they did on the one room first and have them do the house if they did a decent job.

Oops

They lied. Sure, you could put a nicer point on it, but the fact of the matter is this guy lied. He is not there to clean the carpets or sell carpet cleaning to us, but rather he wants to sell us the Kirby vacuuming/carpet cleaning system. Heck, you can read about the ongoing nightmare pitch where they won't leave your home here http://www.cockeyed.com/citizen/kirby/kirby.html and sure enough it went down just like described there. Two hours later, the main salesdude is trying to browbeat my wife into buying a $1000 vacuum. Gimme a break! With the internet at our fingertips, it is impossible to pull this junk off, isn't it? I found their same vacuum on eBay brand new for $300 and they want $1000 for it?! And for some reason trying to push my wife into buying this insanely priced vacuum will earn them a commission? I was just disgusted. I cannot stand lying for this junk. Be up front with me that you want to sell a vacuum and carpet cleaner and will show us how it works by cleaning a room is fine, but two hours on a spiel when you came into my home by lying...see ya, and don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out!

Production Meeting

I just got back from our weekly production meeting. This is where a bunch of us involved with Sunday's Worship Experience sit down and discuss what went right and what went wrong on Sunday. We then do some brainstorming for upcoming ideas and discuss what the upcoming Sunday will look like. I didn't realize it really until today but I enjoy my weekly production meeting. We're all pretty good friends by now and we know on a Sunday when we do something that will be brought up in production meeting! The other day I was told I cannot rest my hand mic on my mute because it's just disgusting! So I have to learn new microphone skills. We're also talking about Amazing Grace the movie and how we can promote it so everybody sees it before Easter. We're concerned it will be gone from the theater on Thursday when they change movies and it will then be hard to find. We're trying to get a trailer to show and because all our kids in Club KP are on the same page in learning as what we do in big church, we're making chains the slaves were kept in for the kids to learn about slavery in Club KP! Trying to remain relevant!

Dilbert comes to life

I have always read from Scott Adams that his ideas for Dilbert come from either his own experiences working in the corporate business world or from suggestions from readers in that world. Certainly a lot of his comics hit really close to home for me and that is why they are so enjoyable. Recently I had an experience though that was straight from the comic strip!

My company is transitioning a lot of engineers to Linux. As part of the program they set around a large test that would take between 10 and 15 hours to complete to test engineers on their Linux knowledge. The reason to take it was the top 10 people who passed would be sent to Germany at our Linux headquarters for three months to learn even more about Linux and eventually be placed on that team.

Well, I had a buddy here at Novell who took the test and passed it well...he was in the top 10 people in all of Novell (about 4,200 employees worldwide). He was very excited about his new opportunities and ready for the trip. Then, about a week and a half after the news he was laid off.

What?!

Yes, let me repeat that, after he tested to be one of the top 10 Linux kernel hackers in the company, they laid him off. It is almost like people are not thinking. This poor guy goes from the emotional high of making it and preparing his family for him being in Germany for three months and everything that entails to not having a job.

Oh, but it gets better. He was called a week after the layoff and offered a job back at Novell to continue with his trip to Germany. I'm afraid this poor guys' emotions have got to be bouncing all over the place! That is where this story stops now...I wonder if Dilbert will have it shortly?

Signs of Spring

So this morning like most mornings I looked out at the pasture to see how the critters were doing. I saw five female pheasants going through the corral looking for food. That's one of our first signs of Spring here in Benjamin. The pheasants getting ready to settle down on the next and hatch some babies. We'll have twenty or thirty running around once it warms up some!

What's on the iPod

I do this every once in a while because I think it's a real good view into who I am. This blog is about being open and honest and just letting people who may be interested in what we are doing at RCC know about me. I am not the lead pastor at church, but I do have the opportunity to serve in leadership and I have the opportunity to serve as point pastor in Provo, so here's more about me!

I usually listen to podcasts on the iPod. I have gigs of podcasts and relatively little music. Most of the podcasts are religion-related as I like to hear others' thoughts because it gets me thinking and helps me to make things clearer in my mind. This morning was not a podcast morning. I needed more, so I went for attitude this morning and played Bocephus to Stir it Up the other day it was Gretchen Wilson, but this morning I needed a bit more.

Loving the poor

This has been an ongoing discussion at RCC recently. About 3-4 weeks ago, our homework in the connection groups talked a lot about helping the poor and what we can do to help out. It gave some specific examples on who might be the poor and who might not be. This sparked an ongoing discussion in my CG and I wanted to share some of my thoughts on it here.

You see, it was my contention that in the United States we have very very few people who are truly poor. That's not to say there aren't people who are struggling to make ends meet or who are having a tough time with their current circumstances, but rather that they are not truly poor. I look at some of the orphans in Mexico or some of the people in India or Sri Lanka. When I look at what is happening in these areas where people are honestly wondering where today's meal is coming from I struggle with anybody in the United States being called poor.

There are just so very few people in the United States that have to worry where dinner is coming from. Now I was told at one point by a person who had been on government assistance that the cheese had mold on it. That was supposed to indicate to me how bad it was getting government cheese, but dang I've cut mold off ccheese before that I had to pay for! Free cheese that needs some mold cut off ddoesn't sound like a huge sacrifice to me.

You see, here in the US I think we are spoiled. We have become spoiled rotten. We do not believe we can live life with only one car for a household or no cable TV or no cell phone. Americans are looking at what our parents have and want it all for ourselves without doing the work for them. This is why the latest report is that saavings is down to the lowest point since the great depression. Everyones' income iis going to service debt because the question of can we afford this is now about affording the payments and not actually buying something.

I heard a pastor this week encourage his congregation to donate lots of gas cards for those people who need to fill the tank so they can get to work. I don't see that as really loving people. Sure, meeting an immediate need makes a person feel good and makes those who had their need met happy, but it does nothing to really love them by perceiving their needs and meeting them. People need to have help in understanding living on a budget. People need help with how to develop a budget and live with it. People need more than a temporary band-aid of meeting their immediate need, but rather they need our time to learn some life skills. That is loving people...including those who feel poor.

What a nerd

So here I lay in bed...laying on my nightstand is Junior. Junior is my new PDA...they are all named 'Junior' a sobriquet my wife gave them a long time ago. Paired with my bluetooth wireless keyboard I am able to blog without even lifting my head from the pillow! Well, gotta go. My daughter needs somebody to read with her for 14 minutes so I'm up!