I got to hold Jake on Sunday!

HA!  Gotcha!  As you may know, my son’s who is going to arrive on the scene in less than a month, name is Jake.  I cannot not tell you how much I am looking forward to holding him, but I still have to wait a little longer for that.  All that being said, I did hold Jake on Sunday!  Albeit not my Jake Some good friends of mine and my wife’s just had their second child on October 16th, and his name happens to be Jake!  We went over to visit them yesterday and I got to practice just a little.  I have to say that it was a truly amazing experience.  I can’t even imagine how I am going to feel the first time I get to hold my own son.  I just held him in my arms and watched him explore the world.  His arms were just moving around in a seemingly aimless fashion, but I can only imagine what he was feeling.  What seemed to me as random movement, was probably his way of saying “wow!  I have room to move around!”  It is so hard to imagine everything being completely new.  Everything in our world that we see everyday and take for granted is something new for him to discover.  Even his own arms, legs, fingers and toes!  I could talk all day about how the entire concept of a baby still blows my mind, but the most amazing part was just how beautiful Jake is.  Everything about him was so beautiful.  I just cannot understand how anybody could hold a newborn baby in their arms and simultaneously deny the existence our Almighty Creator.  This beautiful baby boy was formed in his mother’s womb by the hands of God.  There is absolutly no other adequate explanation.  To suggest that he “just happened”  is completely ludacris!  I am so happy for Jake and his parents.  They are wonderful people and they have 2 beautiful children.  Jake’s mom was a little apprehensive about the daunting task of balancing the 24 hour care required by a new born with the equally important needs of her three year old daughter.  I don’t know if she will ever read this or not, but I must say she made it all look easy.  I think she is an amazing mother, and my wife and I can learn a lot from her.  We definitley have a lot to learn, and our baby Jake is going to be here so soon!  I am so excited!  God is so good, and he has a sense of humor!  While I was enamored by Jake, I didn’t even notice that he had peed on me!  I didn’t care though:)  So much to look forward too!

Harmonious Bliss

To say that life has been turbulent lately, would be the understatement of the century.  The world is a mess.  I have been very busy in my personal life too.  Getting ready for a baby seems like a full time job sometimes, and I know this is only the beginning!  I had the wonderful opportunity to put all of this aside a couple weeks ago.  I sang in the Berry College Alumni Choir.  I’ll give you a little back ground on myself to help illustrate why this was such a big deal for me.  I am blessed to be a fairly talented vocalist.  I don’t really think I’ll ever be a superstar, but I have been singing almost as long as I can remember.  I have always sang in my church, and I started singing in school in the 7th grade.  I never really had any idea that I was any good until the 10th grade though.  10th grade was the first year that I ever tried out for all state choir.  I went into the first audition and came out with a score that was 2 points shy of a perfect score.  It was at this point that I realized that I may be pretty good at the whole singing gig.  That day led to a series of events that eventually led me to major in music in college.  At the “peak” of my singing days I was singing about 4 hours a day, 5 days a week.  I have been involved in some pretty amazing performance experiences.  The most memorable of which all occured in my college concert choir.  In college it became pretty clear that a career directly related to singing may not be the best option for me.  I didn’t want to give up on music though.  Consequently I changed my major to music business.  As life would have it, I have a job that is very much business and not at all music.  I did maintain my music involvement at my church for a few years after college though.  We have since changed churches, and though we love our church for many reasons, there are very few opportunities for me to sing.  Not being able to sing on a regular basis, makes my heart hurt.  It has been such an intergral part of my life for so long.  Two weekends ago I got to sing once again in an alumni gathering of the Berry College Concert Choir.  Words cannot not fully express the good it did for my soul.  The night of the first rehearsal I had had a very long week at work and I was running on about 4 hours of sleep. None of that mattered at that moment.  The music we made in that chapel that night was so wonderful, and I had missed it so much.  I know I may be sounding a little dramatic here, but imagine that one of the things in your life that you are truly passionate about and you truly enjoy slowly gets all but eliminated from you day to day life.  How would you feel if that thing was once again brought into your life?  Even if it were only for a few brief moments, I know you would be excited about it.  Maybe soon I will be able sing on a regular basis again, but until then I will hang onto these moments and look forward to the next one.

Help! There’s no gas!

Okay I’ll admit that when Ike reared his ugly face on the coast of Texas I wasn’t very concerned.  I felt bad for the families directly affected by the storm, and everyone who got displced by the storm, but I thought that it wouldn’t really affect me.  There were rumors flying around that there was going to be a gas shortage caused by potential damage to the refining facilities on the coast of Texas.  So of course everyone ran out to the gas station and filled up.  Due to the sudden increase in demand a few stations ran out of gas.  I still wasn’t worried though.  The same thing happpend 3 years ago when Katrina hit.  Gas prices went up then, but the “shortage” was short lived.  A few days later there was plenty of gas to be had.  I thought the same would be true this time around, but here we are almost 2 weeks after the hurricane hit and there is still a serious shortage of gas.  First of all I would like to say I was wrong!  This is quickly turning into a serious issue.  In the areas surrounding my work and home almost no gas stations have gas.  When a station does get some gas in a line forms that is over an hour long and the supply is quickly exhausted.  There have been reports of fights breaking out at the pumps, and the police have been recruited at some stations to direct traffic and keep the peace.  It is crazy!  I cannot confirm this, but I have heard that this hasn’t really been a problem in other parts of the country.  So this begs the question “what is causing all of this chaos?”  I have no idea, but I wish it would end.  It is very frustrating, but I must admit that a part of me is very fascinated by the whole situation too.  I know that sounds pretty twisted, but just think about it.  We are living history right now.  This is something people will talk about for years.  I remember learning in school about a gas shortage that happend sometime in the 1970′s.  I remember seeing pictures of gas stations with long lines of people waiting for gas.  Now I am witnessing that on my way home from work.  This is something I will probably tell my grandkids about.  Hopefully they will mostly be fascinated by the fact that cars used to run on gasoline!  Call me crazy, but we are in crazy times.  And the God of the universe has brought the United States of America, the greatest country in the world through tougher times than these.  Some cheap readily available gasoline would be nice though

Thanks Ike!

Hurricanes in a word BLOW!  Especially ones that head straight for oil refinaries.  But I really can’t blame the hurricane.  It is actually the media that BLOWS!  They decided to tell the world that gas could hit $5 per gallon if the refining facilities get damaged from hurricane Ike.  So what does everybody do?  They all head to the gas station!  What do the gas stations do?  They jack up their prices $.50 per gallon in a matter of a couple of hours.  Fortunately I filled up my tank yesterday.  Not because I thought this would happen, it was just because I needed gas.  So the same gas that is in the tank underground that I paid $3.50 a gallon for yesterday is magically $4.00 a gallon today.  So let’s review.  There is a chance that refining facilities could get damaged and cause a reduction in gas production.  This potential reduction could cause a shortage in gas.  So the price of gas gets jacked up because of a problem that hasn’t happened yet?  And it may not happen at all!?  I don’t understand how this is not price gouging!  The problem gets worse though.  I live in a small town, and my wife works in a bigger, but still pretty small town.  In both places there were several gas stations that ran out of gas!  I work in metro Atlanta.  The gas prices went up, but no major run on the stations to make them run out of gas.  The small town folks FREAKED OUT because of the lovely media.  I am sure a lot of people who made a run to the gas station didn’t even really need gas at the time.  I understand that legitimate things happen that cause the price of goods and services to flucuate, but let nature take it’s course!  If it is going to happen, there is nothing we can do about it, but let’s not make something out of nothing.  The poor folks on the coast of Texas have a lot to worry about right now, and I hope and pray they all come out of this okay.  But the rest of the world freaking out because there is a chance of a problem is ridiculous.  It’s kind of like buying all the milk and bread because there is a chance of a snow flurrie.  AARRGH!

I froze my credit today…

Yesterday in a word…sucked.  It started out fine.  I went to work just like always and I started in on my typical morning tasks.  And just like I always do when there was a little break in the action I took a look at my friends personal finance blog.  He had posted a reminder to check your credit report.  He suggests doing it quarterly by checking each one of the bureaus once a year.  Although there are only 3 bureaus so I guess you would actually check in thirdly, but that is beside the point.  Foolishly I had never checked my credit report before.  I have applied for credit for various reasons in my life and I have always had excellent credit scores.  I have never asked to see my report though because I always thought everything was fine.  But after reading the post on the blog I thought to myself “you should probably check your credit report.”  So I went online and pulled my report.  Much to my surprise there were some accounts that did not belong to me, and an address that had never belonged to me.  I didn’t panic to much at first because I thought it was probably just an error of some kind.  The accounts in question were all in good standing.  But the address that these accounts linked to was for lack of a better phrase ” a liittle to close to home.”  This led me to start doing a little digging.  I had to ask some very difficult questions and I got some very difficult answers.  I do not want to go into to much detail due to the sensitive nature of the situation, but I found out yesterday that my identity had been stolen over 8 years ago.  I was only 19 years old at the time and in college.   I never had any clue because the person who had opened credit cards in my name had always paid the bill on time.  The situation has been addressed, and the damage is only on an emotional level.  It was one of the worst days I have had in a long time.  But it definitely opened my eyes to the dangers of identity theft.  So last night my wife placed a security freeze on her credit with all three bureaus, and I did the same thing today.  If you don’t know anything about credit security freezes, but it makes it virtually impossible for anyone to apply for credit in your name.  When you freeze your credit each bureau issues you an individual PIN.  Without that PIN no one can run a credit check on you even if they have all the necessary information.  In my state the fee to place a security freeze on your credit is $3 per person per bureau.  Transunion is currently doing it for free if you do the process on line.  The fee to temporarily thaw a credit report in my state is also $3.  So this is really a no brainer.  If I ever do need to apply for credit I simply request a thaw using my PIN with the appropriate bureau.  Another benefit of frozen credit is I will no longer receive the preapproved credit card offers in the mail.  I am definitely not sad about that.  So, if you haven’t checked your credit report lately, do it right now!  I also highly suggest freezing your credit.  It is no more than $10 per person per bureau no matter what state you live in.  Some states are much cheaper.  This method is much more secure and a whole lot cheaper than any credit monitoring service.  Don’t take the chance.  All told I probably have a total of 20 minutes invested in checking and freezing all 3 of my credit reports.  I would never want anyone to deal with the emotions I have been feeling the past 2 days, and I got off with no real harm to my credit.  It could have been a lot worse.

Today was a good day, especially for a Monday!

I had a pretty good day today.  Work was not crazy, and I got to leave at a decent hour.  I recieved a comment on my blog.  That is always exciting.  It was from a friend of mine and he noted that I have more than one reader.  I often joke about having only one reader, but I suppose I should clarify.  I actually know of at least 3 people that read my blog.  I have told many others, so there could be more!  I will probably continue to refer to my “one reader,”  but you can think if it as a collective term of endearment referring to the faithful few!  The one thing that really made today good though was the purchase of a new tool.  It doesn’t really matter what kind of day you’ve had, if you come home with a new tool it’s been a good day.  I bought a pneumatic cut off tool.  It is basically an air powered motor that spins an abrasive disc at about 18,000 revolutions per minute.  It is used for cutting metal, and I just so happen to have some metal that I need to cut.  As you may know I bought a 1988 Ford Mustang a couple months back.  I am slowly working on getting it back to road worthy condition.  It runs okay, but the main thing that is keeping me from enjoying it on the road is the brakes.  The brakes don’t work, and upon inspection I determined that every brake component on the car needs to be replaced.  I could probably get by with reusing some of it, but while I am at it I am going to replace everything.  This is turning into a car tech post, but I guess we’ll go with it!  I purchased a used brake booster and master cylinder, and I have almost completed that swap.  I worked my way to the rear brakes and try as I might I cannot get the passenger side brake drum to come off.  I have tried every trick in the book and then some.  My cousin tried to help me and he had no luck either.  After seeking some professional advice we determined that we were going to have to break the brake drum.  I am going to replace it anyway, so I didn’t care.  The drums are made of cast iron, which is known to be a little brittle.  With this is mind we thought a few good whacks with a hammer should cause the drum to brake.  WRONG!  After beating on it repeatedly there were absolutly no signs that the drum was going to break.  My next thought was to use a cold chisel along with the hammer to get to break.  I didn’t own a cold chisel at the time, so I thought it would be worth a few dollars to invest in one.  Well I bet you saw this coming, but the chisel and hammer routine proved futile as well.  But hey, I own a cold chisel now.  Step three, the Dremel tool.  I love my Dremel tool.  It has come in handy on many occasions for light duty projects.  I would not classify this project as light duty, but I thought I would give it a shot.  I fitted the Dremel with a reinforced cut off wheel (similar to the cut off tool but smaller) and started grinding away at the brake drum.  It didn’t do much to say the least.  Honestly it might actually work, but it would probably take 5 or 6 hours of continuous grinding and several grinding wheels would be sacrificed.  So the only clear solution was to buy a new tool.  I did put a little thought in the purchase though.  It was bought with money that I got form cashing in a couple of ‘E’ series savings bonds that my mom discovered a couple weeks back.  In case you don’t know ‘E’ series bonds are about as good of an investment as putting your money in an old pickle jar and sticking in the back of fridge.  This is precisely why I cashed them in and bought a tool.  If my mom had discovered a couple grand worth of bonds I might have left them alone or at least re-invested them.  But we were dealing with $50 here.  Only slightly better than when you find a $20 bill in your coat pocket that you didn’t know was there.  I’ll let you know how things go with the cut off wheel.  If this doesn’t work I am not sure what I am going to do.  I don’t have $600 for a plasma cutter!

The weight of the world. (or so it may seem…)

There is more going on in my life right now than there has been in a long time.  Frankly, it has had me a little worked up.  I am typically a pretty laid back kind of guy, but lately I have been quite the worry wart.  What’s the trouble you ask?  The biggest thing concerns my son.  He has not even arrived in the world yet , but sometimes I feel like I am already doing a bad job as his dad.  I am not quite sure how I am going to afford the little guy.  When we add up all the things we need and all the monthly expenses we are going to have, the numbers don’t quite add up like I think they should.  You may say, “well shouldn’t you have thought about that before you decided to have a kid?”  Well I could not agree more with that statement.  I think that having a planned child knowing you cannot afford it is highly irresponsible.  My wife and I put a lot of consideration into all aspects of having a baby and we had our plan worked out well ahead of time.  The problem is that the cost of everything keeps going up!  We change the plan, and then bam!  The budget has to change again!  This whole thing has had me quite disturbed.  After several days of this worrying, I finally feel better.  I kept trying to figure this out my way and I have been missing the point completely.  I had to give it back to God.  I had to remember that everything I have is His.  Even my unborn son is His.  God has always been faithful to take care of my needs and then some.  I know in my heart that He has a plan and He will not leave me alone.  My head has been getting in the way of this lately.  Simply reminding myself of this has been a huge burden off my shoulders.  God, our baby has come along in your perfect time, and I know you have a plan for my family.  Help me to not forget this, and may you receive all the glory.  Thank you for all you have done for me and my family.  The other thing that has had me worried is my sister.  She is getting married in 2 months and neither her or her future husband have a job.  They are dilligently looking for jobs, but I cannot help but worry.  I want my sister to be happy, and I want the start of her married life to be wonderful for her.  I don’t want her to start life with a huge burden, or a job she hates.  I know that God is in control here too though.  There are just so many loose ends they need to tie up, and a lot of the hinge on employment.  I pray for God’s best for both of them.  I also pray that their hearts would be open to whatever it is God has in store for them.  Well I must say that writing about things helps too.  I am truly blessed with a wonderful family, and I want everyone to be healthy and happy.  Thank you God for everything you have blessed me with.  You are truly amazing!