may the revelation of the miracle of Christmas be yours this season.
Another amazing year. It was my first Christmas in the new house. Everyone gave some really cool stuff. They gave me a Doomsday Device, a gift card to starbucks. The Big Love 1st and 2nd series on DVD. Patti got her standing jewlwery box, jewlery, her carpet steaming cleaner, the kids got lots of stuff. DS lites, video ipods, jackets, blankets, jewlwery. It was a good christmas.
let’s talk turkey (and eggnog and noisemakers, for that matter). we’re in the middle of the holiday season (no, that’s not a poloticliy correct term; i’m talking about thanksgiving, christmas and new year’s) and i have just one question: do you even remember what it’s all about?proably not, because we’ve burried the magic of those holidays under so much noise and lights that we really don’t enjoy thsi time of year – and we certainly don’t grow spiritually from the gifts that are right in front of us. over time, we’ve mangled these holidays into unrecognizable displays of gluttony and greed. I was Christmas shopping with me wife the other day and saw some gift mugs with greetings like “Happy Holiday Season” and “Merry Holiday”
take thanksgiving, for instance. in november 1789, presdent George Washington made thanksgiving a national holiday when he declared that the nation needed “a day of public thanksgiving and prayer.” somehow, thsi day in late november that was intended to be a timeout to give thanks to God has turned into a faest of food and football that has nothing to do with prayer (unless you count praying for your football team doesn’t get slaughtered).
christmas is intended to celebrate the birth of Christ, but political correcetness and consumerisim (new word jsut learned thsi past wednesday” have mangled it so far beyond recnogition that i’m actually surprised when i see a reference to Baby Jesus anymore.
january 1st offers the promise of a new start and a new calendar year, but it’s become an excuse to party and drink so much that you wake up not even knowing what day it is.
it’s no wonder that, after the turkey-comas and empyt boxes and wrapping paper have disappeared, the only thing left over from the holidays is a bigger waistline and more credit card debt.
i want us to take back the real meaning of these holidays. i don’t think it’s an acident that they are clustered together; i see it as divine design. every year they offer us a clear series of steps we can take to become better people.
step one is gratitude. thanksgiving gives us the opportunity to humble ourselves and give thanks for the many blessings we have. prayers help us find peace and acceptance with who we are.
step two is redemption. you know that i believe christmas is more about the death of the man than the birth of the child. we celebrate the birth of the baby on december 25th, but the reason for His existence was so His death would cleanse our sins. His journey, from manger to cross, gives us a second chance.
step three is hope. the new year gives us a clean slate, made posible because we’ve already humbled ourselves, given thanks, and found redemption. you can’t succeed in your resolutions if you are still damaged from the past or if they are just a list on a piece of paper.
none of these holidays started out as anything super extravgent. thanksgiving was just a proclimation, christmas began in a stable, and the new year has always just been a day on the calendar. but there magic is in what they represent and in the opportunities they give us. they are very simple in their rewards: your parents orniments; your child discovering guessing there presents; the promise of a new year.
the true gifts of the season aren’t in a lighting display or a gourmet meal; they are in your heart, and gathered around your table. you just have to take the time to look for them.
traditions and glittery stuff are fine — but our souls need attention, too. their is such a thing as a second chance and i hope, if you need one, you will find it thsi season in all the blessings around you.
The Engineer’s Night Before Christmas …
Twas the night before Christmas and I had finally gotten home
When my Wife met me at the door and handed me the phone.
“It’s that darn remote control thing” she said in great dismay
And the Burk doesn’t call simply to say Happy Holiday.
So while my children were hanging the stockings by the chimney with care
I’m preoccupied trying to get the transmitter back on the air.
“ON filaments, ON plate, NO output? You stupid ____”
“Recycle, RESET, Overload? I’m fixen —-!!”
Regaining my composure to notice my Daughter’s staring face
Asking “Daddy – do you HAVE to go to that transmitter place??”
“Yes Honey”, I said “But it won’t be for long”
Hoping deep down inside that I wasn’t wrong.
So out I trudged into the cold winter’s night
To the world’s most remote tower site.
Driving past all the houses, lit up with holiday glee
Feeling sorry for myself — and asking why me ??
But as I got closer my heart was feeling some lighter
when all of a sudden — I started hearing the EXCITER!
“Powr Supply”! I thought … “surely it’s not the final”
My heart’s racing now, anticipating my arrival.
With schematic after schematic dancing in my head
“what if the plate transformer’s shorted dead”??
Throwing open the gate and running into the shack
I start to tackle the problem and race around the back
Where much to my amazement what did I see ??
A half open back door door — apparently not shut good — BY ME !!
So as I return to my cottage after a night so tiring,
I’m wondering if perhaps McDonald’s is hiring !
Then I think “What a profession — I could never leave”
After all, I’ve got maintenance scheduled for NEW YEARS’S EVE !!
MERRY CHRISTMAS ALL!!!
Author Unknown
i hate it when i see people defeating ground. pastor is a great example of doing this. I was at quiks and qoutes the other day and you just had to see this for yourself- atleast three powerstrips strung up to the center display all on one of those flat twowire extension cords with three ends on the tip and at least 5 ground lifts. I mean the only reason they put that third prong on outlets is to make you buy a new extension cord profiting the company that makes the cords. right?
ok, maybe not the devil. but defintly evil. i mean they are everywhere. It all began when they bought youtube. then offered an obscene amount of email storage space. they are now selling radio comercials based on there adsense software. and soon- will have bought doubleclick. Why does this worry me. because we just bought into double click. now it won’t be long before all of our online sales are based on adsense. oh well.. what can you do right? won’t be long before they buy up myspace. or worse yet…
patti could probably tell this story better than i could
Friday night was Sonnie’s Christmas party and Clear Channel’s party. I was looking forward to the clear channel party but i also wanted to see sonnie and the gang. So we decided to skip the clear channel party. later on we decided we could go after sonnie’s. So i’m at home trying to get things hurried up so we can have pleanty of time, when Patti lets me know that we were going to clear channel’s first.
so we get there and not long after we are there, the ac in the server room at the radio station decided to die. so we took off to get that taken care of and stay on the air, people at the party are starting to panic because i wasn’t there. i had no idea. nobody told me i needed to be there.
so anyway.. i finally make it there only to find out that they were waiting for me to start the awards.. and on top of all that, they decided to give me the employee of the year award. again. so that’s what all the hoopla was about.
well. the award kind of broke in shipping so instead they gave me this.. um.. lamp. picture soon to follow.
It was a strange Christmas that year. The kids were all outside all excited about the sleet in the air. It was only sleet right? Well. A few sleet-men later, several calls about KBFM and KTEX’s transmitter getting high VISWR from a frozen antenna and eventually shutting off- yea it sure was snow. On christmas eve of all nights. Although i’ve gotten to experience snow in lots of different places, this time it was different. It was something out of the ordinary and something the folks from the valley would appericate. For many of them, probably the only snow they’d ever seen.
found out that CompUSA is closing. Not just here but everywhere. That’s the only decent computer store left here in the valley. There used to be several. PC Central was an old favorite. but now.. well.. you walk into Dr. PC’s and ask for a DB9 gender changer and you get the blank look across the face of the guy who only speaks half english. Not much more luck at Radio Shack. The store which recently announced that it would be discontinuing it’s radio products (CB’s, HAM, Shortwave, etc)
So i went to go use up some gift cards as long as they still had value. Talked to our account rep and he was pretty depressed. As were most all the employees. But they are liquidating everything in the store so they got some really good deals. I’m keeping my eye on some HD flat tv’s waiting for the 80% off, everything must go sale.
ok.. something really screwed up with this thing. for some odd reason that last post went out to everyone. not just the subscribers. so i’ve killed the plugin entirely. sorry about the spam. Well.. to make the most of an embarasing situation, many of you may not have been here in quite a while. fell free to take a look around. it may have changed since the last time.
I was visiting the links on my website, hit badger, badger, badger. funny how that thing never gets old. Anyway.. i found this interesting link with instructions on how to install linux on a dead badger. Read if your not afraid to kill off 10 minutes for no particular reason.
Yikes. i don’t know why this thing decided to “work” all of a sudden.. but this post to sent to everyone who has ever subscribed to my blog. it won’t happen again. promise.