Alabama 49 - Arkansas 14

I've had a sense of foreboding ever since the Crimson Tide thoroughly dismantled Clemson on the first Saturday of this college football season. I imagine it's something akin to the feeling that Cubs fans get every year. Something along the lines of, "yeah, we look pretty good, but you just wait... we'll find some way to screw it up." After all, Alabama finished 7-6 last year. How on earth could they continue to win before shooting themselves in the foot?

All that to say, I had penciled this weekend's game as one of those potential Saturdays where Alabama would find a way to blow it. Arkansas always plays Alabama with some kind of indomitable will in Fayetteville, and I figured Alabama would have its focus set squarely on next week when they travel to Athens to take on the #3 Georgia Bulldogs. If you were looking for the textbook example for a  potential trap game, you'd be hard pressed to find a better one than the Alabama-Arkansas game.

As you can see, I was clearly nervous about this game. Then the most ominous of all omens occurs - Lee Corso picked Alabama to win during this morning's edition of College Gameday  (we all knew he would, but every week I pray against it). Bama fans are familiar with how Corso's prognostications usually turn out when he picks UA; the Crimson Tide usually lose big. 

My feelings of doom of course now being confirmed by Lee "let's kill Alabama's chances" Corso, I tried to remain outwardly cheery and confident lest Liss feel my now substantial doubts about our beloved Tide. Finally kickoff rolls around and Bama quickly appears to run its first drive straight into the ground. My sense of doom deepens. Then Arkansas proceeds to hand Bama the first of many gifts throughout the game... on 4th and 4 PJ Fitzgerald gets bumped while punting the ball and turns in an Oscar-worthy performance.

Flag.

On.

The.

Play.

Penalty - Arkansas. Running into the kicker - 5 yard penalty which results in a first down for Alabama. After that, there was no looking back. Alabama racked up more than 300 yards running the ball, and the defense intercepted Arkansas QB Casey Dick FOUR times. Two of which were returned for touchdowns. At the half Alabama led 35-7, and they looked like they could name the final score.

The rest of the game was 30 minutes of relishing the fact that maybe just this Crimson Tide football team is made of tougher, more spirited stuff than that of previous teams. Not only are they beating the teams that they are supposed to beat, they are beating them senseless. I can't wait for next week's game at Georgia.

Except I have this sneaking feeling....

A very happy birthday!

Is there anything more contagious than laughing (the common cold notwithstanding)? Over the Labor Day weekend, Liss and I went down to Jackson to hang out with family and go to Grandpa Harold's birthday party (G'pa Harold is my step-mom's dad, but he has always treated Liss and I like we have been in the family since we were born). I think the photos below may tell more about how much fun we had than I could possibly write.

I hope you smile :)

Wow that's a lot of white people

I'm watching the Republican National Convention, and it's frighteningly caucasian. Of course, you would expect that the vast majority of the delegates attending the RNC to be white folks, but I have seen very few non-white people.

I know that's a petty complaint, and it's certainly no reason to support or not support a political party (or is it?). However, considering how every single speaker, every single video, every single angle, every single breath is weighed, measured and produced it's shocking to see such a grossly unrepresentative crowd. Are the Republicans afraid to let minorities into their power structure? I doubt it, but you sure wouldn't know it by watching the convention coverage tonight.

Oh well, that's enough of politics...

Alabama 34 - Clemson 10

First of all, thank goodness football season is here.

Second of all, thank goodness I have a wife who is as crazy as I am about wanting to watch every single snap of every possible game.

Third of all, are you kidding me?? Bama made it look like they were playing the Tuscaloosa High School JV team when they took Clemson to the woodshed outback of the Georgia Dome. Full disclosure here: Liss and I were discreetly keeping tabs on the score while at Grandpa Harold's 80th birthday party, so we missed most of the first half. However, the part of the game I saw was unbelievable. Who took my beloved Crimson Tide that regularly blows first half leads and replaced them with this freak of a machine that completely dismantled the three-headed Clemson offensive attack?

The expectations are through the roof for me now. I mean, Clemson was supposedly the 9th best team in the country (according to the Associated Press), and Alabama beat them by 24 points. We'll find out more about Alabama when they face Georgia in Athens a few weeks from now, but the Clemson game leaves me feeling like there just might be a chance...

Roll Tide!

The Hope of Art

This is probably as philosophical as my blog will ever get. As you read in my last post, Liss and I attended the Echo Church Media Conference from Thursday-Saturday, and we had a great time.

Being able to exhibit for SPEAK! was great, but if you want to read about that, you can go to http://www.speakcreative.com/news. Because I was exhibiting at the conference, I was able to attend all of the keynote sessions (the exhibit halls were deserted during this time), and I came away from the collective experience understanding that there truly are people in the church who are passionate about bringing the Gospel to the masses, specifically using media. No, it wasn't the cheesy GodTube presentation of media. The entire conference focused on helping Christians make excellent media, whether it was specifically Christian media or not. 

Some of the videos that were presented were absolutely spectacular. Skills that, in all honesty, I didn't think the Christian community possessed were on display, and it was incredible. Once again, my skepticism in the creativity of God was swept aside in an instant. As I was reminded many times throughout the keynote presentations, the Church used to be a bastion - in fact THE bastion - of creativity. Consider the beauty of stained-glass windows, the awe-inspiring works of the Renaissance that present the Gospel and the sheer volume of architectural advances brought on by the building of cathedrals. I don't know exactly when we began to drift away from highly valuing art - perhaps it was a natural response of the Reformation, perhaps the Puritans who settled in America never really allowed it to flourish like it might have on the Continent, maybe we just wanted to spend some time away from art.

Whatever reason for our long divorce with art, I pray and, if it were possible to create change just by force of will, hope that the divorce is coming to a close. Seeing some of the art that came out of the Echo Conference, I certainly believe the quality of work is excellent and inspiring. As our new Michelangelos and Titians emerge, surely not everyone will love their work. However, it is my fervent hope that the church would view their work and see opportunities to improve and diversify the media that filters into the world - always, above all, striving for excellence.

I've rambled on for a while, so I'll go. The next time you feel urged to pick up a brush, a camera, a typewriter (or laptop), a guitar or any other instrument to create art - think on how you can do it more excellently than before. After all, as DaVinci modeled, you can be good at more than just what you originally planned on doing in life. 

With that parting thought, I'll leave. I'll also probably come back and butcher this post because I've changed my mind or otherwise become embarrassed for thinking I've thought more deeply on this subject than anyone else...

Generic profound blog title goes here

Ok, so Liss and I are up for a "late night" tonight (it's still only about 10:30) while we're finishing up some laundry before we leave for Dallas tomorrow. We're going to the Echo Conference (http://www.echoconference.com) being hosted by Watermark Community Church, and it's probably the conference that I've been most excited about going to.

Of course, I'll be working the conference for SPEAK!, as I show of SiteWrench 4.0 (it's awesome) and some of our other services, but because Liss will be headed to Dallas with me, I'm really looking forward to just getting to hang out with the wife for a couple of days. I'm also hoping she makes lots of friends at the conference break-out sessions, so she can tell them how awesome her husband and SPEAK! are (I hope I'm awesomer than SPEAK!, but I don't know... and yes, I know awesomer isn't a word... yet).

Anyway - watching the Olympics while the laundry is drying, and I'm slightly concerned for NBC next week when Michael Phelps is finished with all of his swimming. I mean, I'm the first to admit that his story is by far the most compelling athletic story coming out of the 29th Olympiad, but I don't think NBC will be able to stretch the Phelps storyline throughout the duration of the Olympics. Maybe they'll just follow him around as he trades pins with other athletes. No doubt if pin trading were an Olympic sport, he'd take gold in that as well...

I'm watching the women's relay right now and just realized that the Olympic pool has LIFEGUARDS! Seriously?! Maybe it's just a cushy appointed job that I can get hooked up with through the IOC. You know the lifeguards are bored out of their minds...

I wish I had something profound to say about the absurdities of a world that has the most developed athletes than ever before in its history being coddled by lifeguards, but I'm struggling as I start thinking about going to bed...

Good night all! Headed to the big D tomorrow!

Good weekend

So this weekend was pretty kick-butt. Liss and I had (as always) our date night Friday night. Nothing fancy.. we ate at Qdoba and hung out at Barnes & Noble to catch up on some reading. It was a really nice night of just getting to slow down and spend some time with each other.

Saturday we met our small group (I love those guys!) downtown to see Get Smart, eat at the Flying Fish and Cheesecake Corner and generally have a good time. Get Smart was quite funny (Steve Carell made it awesome, especially when waxing lyric about Chuck Norris), but I'm pretty sure the rest of the group got their chuckles from watching me laugh so much... Oh well. The Flying Fish was quite good (the crawfish po'boy had enough heat to get my nose running, always a good sign for me), and if you haven't been to the Cheesecake Corner, you're really missing out.

Anyway.. much to the chagrin of the rest of the group, I took along my trusty D70S to document the whole outing. I've posted some good ones below. If you're friends with Liss on Facebook, be sure to check out some more. If you'd like 5x7s or 8x10s of any of these photos, you can mail a check to Matt Roberts in the amount of $1,000.00. Bulk discounts are, of course, available. I hope you enjoy the photos... I'll try to be better about getting some other stuff up soon!

eh...Hello! Cruising sure was fun.

Alright, so...yeah... I didn't post at all in May (as if Liss isn't the only one who reads this blog on any kind of a regular basis). I blame it on the cruise.

Seven days of total awesomeness. The bluest, most perfect water you've ever seen in your life surrounds you night and day. We had perfect weather, and our ports of call (the Bahamas, St. Thomas and St. Maarten) were incredibly fun (as always). 

The Bahamas:

The last time Liss and I were in the Bahamas, it was the first day of our honeymoon. Needless to say, we didn't do a whole lot of exploring.... yeah... Anyway! We took the time to actually walk around Nassau, and I'm so glad we did! I took my camera (Nikon D70S), and I got some photos that I'm pretty excited about (we're getting the one below framed to put in the kitchen).

St. Thomas:

This is by far mine and Liss' favorite port of call so far. From the port, there's about a mile and a half walk to the downtown area. Of course, the main streets are tourist havens, full of shops that have been setup specifically for cruisers, but if you walk from the water-side street to the alleys that run perpendicular, you'll find some great shops with everything from handblown glass jewelry to Belgian chocolates to pirate and colonial artifacts. OK, I know that last one sounds lame, but seriously - ever seen a real pirate sword? Heck, if you've got a few grand to plunk down, you can buy the sucker.

Once we'd gotten our fill of shopping and walking around downtown, we walked back towards the port and got on the St. Thomas SkyRide. After a 5-10 minute gondola ride up to the top of the mountain range (well.. that's probably an exaggeration) that splits the island in two, we got an awesome view, lunch and adult beverage. When we retire, we'll retire to St. Thomas.

St Maarten:

The cool thing about St. Maarten is that it's split between two separate countries - France and the Netherlands. We disembarked on the Dutch side and caught a cab over to the French side. While we were there, we did some open-market shopping and picked up some really tasty crepes with Nutella (that stuff rocks, by the way).

Back on the Dutch side, we avoided most of the touristy stuff and parked it on the beach for several hours. I kicked back with a book under the umbrella, and Liss laid out. It was gloriously lazy and relaxing. Before we caught the taxi back over to the ship, we picked up some ice cream at this great little creamery that's along the beach front (Liss and I first saw it the last time we were in St. Maarten).

So yeah... that's about it. Well except for a gluttonous amount of food, Vegas-style shows and a lot of hanging out in the pools and on the water slide, amongst other things (all on the ship). Good times were had by all!

Run, don't walk, to Muddy's. Seriously. Now.

Saturdays are always incredible. Yesterday was no exception. Liss and I woke up late, took the dogs on a walk and after that... well, pretty much just hung out all afternoon except for playing Wii (Liss surprised me with it on Friday!).

After relaxing, we met up with Matt and Mary Jane to grab some dinner at Bosco's, and if not for the incredible dessert at Muddy's, I'd probably be writing about the great pizza (Germantown Purist).

We wrapped up dinner around 7:30, so we piled into Stella in search of something sweet. Matt told us a few weeks ago about a review in the Commercial Appeal that gushed over this new bake shop, so we decided to give it a try.

Two things immediately grab your attention when you walk in.

The first is that the mixers on the counter are covered in flour, utensils are scattered neatly (is that possible?) and there are dishes sitting near the back of the kitchen waiting to be washed. In other words, the bake shop actually baked all of its own goodies (and not just that morning).

The second is the smell. If you want to make an obscene amount of money, find a way to bottle that smell and sell it as a perfume. I don't even know how to describe it except to say that the shop smells as good as its products taste, and that says a lot.

Anyway, we pick out some cupcakes to try, grab some coffee and sit down (by the way, the cupcakes are $1.50 - an amazing steal if you ask me). We'd heard good things about Muddy's, and I've got to say, it did not even come close to disappointing. The first bite completely redefined my view on cupcakes, and baked goods for that matter. You should stop reading right now and go get one (you've got 8 minutes - Muddy's is open until 11:00 most days). You're not going to understand how good the cupcakes are until you taste them for yourself. We'll probably need to start a support group, because I'm addicted.

To top it all off, we heard the owner of Muddy's Bake Shop (Kat Gordon) chatting away with curious customers about how she bakes all of her little bundles of joy. She seemed to be a genuinely cheerful, kind person, and after tasting the delicious products she's creating, I wish her all the success in the world.

She's not paying me for an endorsement, but if I started getting a dozen cupcakes delivered to my door every Monday, you wouldn't hear me complaining.

In closing, go there. Now. 2 minutes left.

Visit the Muddy's website here: http://www.muddysbakeshop.com

God Bless Capitalism

So here's the deal. Liss and I have a budget with which we try to be very disciplined (the Exploder is only going to last so long), so today I was reviewing our online statement. When I logged off, I was more than a little surprised.

I find an ad (see below) encouraging me to lock in a "jumbo loan at a great rate."

Considering the major crisis that most major financial institutions are facing (namely because of the real-estate fallout), you'd think that Wachovia would have something better to do than trying to rope someone into borrowing more money than they have any business applying for, but apparently you'd be wrong. I've got to say, I think this practice is despicable.

Sure, encourage people to explore their options for loans. Tell them you've got great rates, fine. A "jumbo loan" though? Seriously? I know there's nothing morally wrong with the ad, but I'm just asking for a tiny bit of ethical integrity from my bank. I certainly don't see it being expressed in this ad.

I think I'm done now.

Maybe.

Kansas Sucks, Cars, Roll Tide, 30 Rock and more

Where to begin? Maybe the NCAA tournament...

I still can't believe that Memphis lost to Kansas. That's how it happened, by the way. Kansas didn't beat Memphis. Memphis lost.

I don't think you can say that any group of college age athletes choked. I mean, they don't get paid to play the game, so you can't hold them to a professional standard of failure. John Calipari gets paid pretty decent money to make sure that the team can close out games. I'm still dumbfounded as to why he didn't call a timeout when Memphis was up by 3 in the final seconds of regulation. I imagine he'll be wishing he'd used that timeout from now until... well, a long time. My heart goes out to the Mays who were able to travel to San Antonio at the last minute to see the game only to see their beloved team collapse just seconds short of the national championship.

On the lighter side of things, Stella (our Dodge Stratus - see story below) is healed. The Shell station stepped up and did the right thing to pay for the repairs (mind you they made it clear that they were doing it as a courtesy NOT as an indemnification). Anyway, Stella got her groove back, and we're grooving all the way to Tuscaloosa this weekend.

Speaking of which, Liss and I are uber-pumped about seeing the Tide play in the A-Day Game this weekend. Reading about the team online, it seems like our receivers have had mixed-results in the first two scrimmages, so it'll be fun to be able to make some (completely inaccurate, I'm sure) judgements on how the new offense is coming along. 

Is there a funnier show than 30 Rock on television right now? I've only been able to watch a few episodes, but I've found myself laughing out loud (much to Nola and Allie's chagrin) more often than not. Of course, we're gearing up for the new episode of The Office that's coming on in about 5 minutes, so I could be retracting this post shortly.

Lastly, we're about to eat some Knock-ya-Naked cake, and I think the euphoria is about to make my legs go numb. Or maybe I pinched a nerve in my back... Either way, I'm about to instantly gain 10 pounds, and I couldn't be happier about it.

Finally some answers!

So here's one of the beautiful things about working for a business that is affiliated with the Church - you see some very weird stuff. Especially when we work on so many website projects, we run into some very weird ideas.

From bad church websites  (the animated .gif with spinning Jesus wasn't cool 10 years ago, much less now) to weird children's ministry videos (www.booples.com, if you go please watch the preview of the episode Not Curly, But Straight), there are some outrageous concoctions out there floating around the intertubez.

Of course, no one is surprised, after all everyone knows that the Internet is the breeding ground of all things weird, stupid or just plain outrageous. Around the office, anytime we find something particularly disturbing or funny we'll pass the link around for everyone to get a good chuckle, and today we found a gem.

iGod. Repenting made easy.

The website simulates a chat room type experience with God. To be fair, the opening page warns you that you should enter with a sense of humor, and if you can get past the sacrilegious preconceptions, it actually is quite funny. I've posted a couple of screenshots of my conversations for your amusement.

Want to have a go with igod yourself? Go nuts.

I'll also try to make it a regular habit of posting some of the more absurd stuff we come across.

Go Tigers Go!

When it comes to football, I bleed crimson (Roll Tide!), but it's pretty fun cheering on my adopted Memphis Tigers basketball team. Seeing them dismantle Texas to the tune of 85-67 (in Houston, no less) made quite a statement and was totally worth sacrificing my usual Sunday afternoon nap. Now the Tigers are set for a Final Four showdown with UCLA in San Antonio, and all that stands between them and a national championship is 80 minutes.

Go Tigers Go!

Oh by the way - 83.3% from the free-throw line for the game. I'd say that's a statement in and of itself.

The joy of automobile ownership

What can I say? Anyone that knows me knows that my relationships with cars has always been slightly abusive. Going through high-school, I totaled more than my or my entire family combined's fair share of cars. I especially had a penchant for hitting non-moving objects. You know, parked cars, mailboxes, trash-cans and the like. As long as it was moving, though, no object would suffer the wrath of my front (or rear) bumper.

Then marriage happened. Something about that whole process of being responsible for another human being brought an epiphany to me - maybe I should stop trying to wreck everything in sight and just settle for lower car insurance premiums, and would you know it? I've gone the past three years without incident (no wrecks, no tickets, not even a warning)!

Until yesterday.

Liss and I were in Stella (all my cars have old lady names - except for the Explorer who is known simply as the Exploder), and we had just finished filling her up at the Shell station on Dexter and Germantown Parkway. The Dexter exit of the Shell was really backed up, so I was pulling around to the Germantown exit when we hit a bump, came down and heard a big cracking sound. Immediately Liss and I looked at each other - she was worried about the car, I was worried about my pristine driving record. I pulled the car to a parking spot to get out and check her over, and let's just say that as soon as I looked under the car, there was no question as to whether we were driving home. 

The car had come down on one of the tank caps that you see tankers using to fill up the large underground gasoline tanks, and the cap punched a hole the size of my fist in (what I'm hoping is) the Stratus' oil pan. 

So there I am, standing in the Shell parking lot watching my poor Stella bleed to death, and I'm furious. We were just driving around the bloody parking lot for crying out loud!

I go talk to the attendant in the station and she puts me on the phone with the station manager ("I'm sorry Mr. Roberts but there's nothing I can do 'til Monday"). After that, there's nothing really except to call a wrecker to haul Stella off to a shop a couple of miles away and wait on Matt May (has God ever made a kinder soul than Matt May?) to ruin his evening plans and pick us up and take us back to our house.

You'd think Murphy's Law had played its little game with us and would leave us alone for a little while, but you'd be wrong....

Less than 24 hours later, I left the lights on in the Exploder and killed her battery.

Oh well - this should mean car troubles are far behind for the next five years or so, or it could mean I'll be updating this entry tomorrow with yet another incident.