medium – Page 11 – The only certainty is bad grammar

Mad Men, golf and Instagram.

June 11, 2012 Crystal god, humor, im cool, medium

When I woke up this morning at 5 a.m., the first thing I did was hit my alarm clock. Four times.

At 5:40 a.m., when I was finally up and peeing, I made a goal — do not read anything at all about last night’s season finale of Mad Men.

I failed before lunch.

Actually, if you count the Ghirardelli Sea Salt Soiree I at my desk first thing this morning as breakfast, then I think I technically failed during breakfast.

Sigh.

The show is amazing though and I’m fully confident that I will still have immense pleasure from watching it OnDemand tonight, even though I know that (spoiler alert) Don will run into Peggy at a theater.

I would have watched it live, but a. I only pay for basic cable, so I can’t watch AMC live, only OnDemand and b. I was too exhausted from my trying to beat my pastor (who has a master’s degree in the bible or God or something) at Bible Trivia and then trying to ~~hit~~ get my golf club to connect to golf balls at the driving range by my church during our first Youth Summer Sunday Night Golf Outing.

Considering my pastor is well, a pastor, I think my bible trivia team held its own. If only I had remember that Bathsheba was Solomon’s mom. Oh well. Next time I guess.

As for the golf stuff, one of the youth gave me a tip to line up my left foot with the golf while using the driver, and I have to admit, it totally upped my club-to-ball connection stats by like 44% and I’m pretty proud of myself for knowing what a driver is.

The golf outings are extremely awesome. What happens is, we have a regular youth group time at the church on Sunday nights like we do all year, and then anyone who wants to hops in our cars and we go over the driving range and try to see who can hit golf balls the furthest.

It’s a great draw to get kids to come to youth group during the summer months, and best of all it’s cheap. A large basket of golf balls is like $17, but the guy at the course knows us so sometimes he’ll only charge $12.50.

As with all life events these days, I took plenty of Instagram pictures at the driving range last night to document all the fun we were having.

Instagram is awesome by the way because I can now make all my cell phone pictures look like they were taken under professional lighting. I do worry about the day someone comes up with Writeagram though, and everyone starts thinking their writing can be fixed with an app and a word filter. I’m sure that would be just as annoying as I am to all the “real” photographers out there when I use the x-pro filter. But I don’t care right this second, because like I said, my photos are BEAUTIFUL now!

Behold:

Our awesome youth-helper-out and one of the youth.

And this one, of our pastor with a master’s in God, and two youth.

And this one, where we see what I would look like without bangs.

And this one, which I caught on accident, of a youth trying to kill our youth-helper-out dude. Fun times.

And, what the heck, here’s one more for the road of me in my all-time favorite sunglasses. I’m posting it so that one day, I can look back on this and think, “Man, with the right bronzer, a pair of dangling earrings and purple sunglasses, I was totally decent looking at 28 years old.”

Also, I’m slated to go to Colombia a week from today for work. As in the country that Google Maps tells me is at the top of South America, and NOT some place in Missouri. I’ve been told that if I’m kidnapped, they’ll probably use my passport photo for the news stories about the “American reporter captured by drug cartel” stories. Instead though, can you tell them to use this one? I did the double french braids myself! Thanks!

Moving, etc.

Published: May 24, 2012 / Updated: May 24, 2012 Crystal medium, Wow

I’m moving to a new apartment this weekend.

It’s .8 seconds from Taco Bell, which obviously was a major selling point. That and the in-unit washer and dryer.

It’s also about 10 minutes from my church. I wanted to write “less than 10 minutes,” because that sounds better, but really, it’s 10 minutes.

Either way though, it’s about a solid 36 hours closer than current place, which is three or four towns over, depending on which map you use.

I’ve invested a lot in that church, and the congregation there, and I truly love the idea of being closer to that community more than you know.

I fantasize about saying things like, “Oh, let me just run over to the church real quick.” And “Oh, that’s fine, I was going to be driving past the church later today anyway.”

Good stuff.

Of course, because of my inability to pick jobs based on reason, my new place is still a solid hour from my full-time job. And that sucks.

But I have flexible hours, I listen to KLove while I drive, and I get to work-from-home often enough that I’m not too worried about it. Check back in a year, and you might get a different answer. But for now, I’m just excited to have convenient access to seven layer burritos (see: url) at all hours of the day and night. I swear to you that I would eat Taco Bell for breakfast if they were open then.

Moving has been a process for sure. Everyone seems to think I move like once a week or something, but I actually only really do it about once a year. Which isn’t so bad for a single 28-year-old in the suburbs.

Plus, this time, I have to get a bigger place because my brother is living with me. The poor guy has been sleeping on my couch since January, counting down the days until my lease expires. In the new apartment, he’ll have his own bedroom, his own walk-in closet and even his own bathroom. What more is there in life?

Finding the place was a journey though. At first I had my heart set on a two-bedroom town home that a private owner was renting out. Alas, she looked at my student loan debt, and subsequent credit score and decided she wanted first and last month’s rent as well a $1,500 security deposit. For those playing along at home, that’s $3,5,00 total.

If I had the ability to save up $3,500 in anything other than a 401k, I’m thinking I probably wouldn’t have so much student debt in the first place.

So that whole thing didn’t happen.

Then, in desperation, I tried to look at some places on a Sunday, only to remember that stupid apartment complexes are closed on Sundays.

Really?

No. Really?!!??

What the what now?

I’m all in favor of Sabbath and stuff, but there’s some professions that just have to work on the sacred day. Among them are youth leaders and people who rent out living spaces.

If I could come see your units between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, then I probably wouldn’t have a job, and you want me to have a job, don’t you? What’s that? You’re open Saturday, from noon to 4 p.m.? Well aren’t you sweet. Now I just have to figure out how to look at 35 complexes in four hours. Awesome sauce.

Anyway, I ended up applying for an apartment in something called HighPoint Community, on HighPoint Drive (one word, two capital letters, hard to explain).

The leasing agents were nicer than nice, and I had a Realtor friend with me through it all to help ease the awkward conversations about the fact that my credit score is the same as my apartment number.

In the end, I got approved and everything worked out, but only after they randomly found a $183 electric bill I’d long forgotten about from Iowa, circa. 2006 and then I paid it so that I could meet their approval process.

The fact that they tracked thing down seriously makes me worried about our country. I promise on my heart that I really, truly did not know that was outstanding, and can only offer the fact that I was young and broke at the time as justification.

Although, well, I guess I’m still technically both those things, I just have a better car now.

Anyway, like I said, it all worked out. And I’m slated to sign the lease this afternoon.

Right after that, I’m totally going to start packing.

My Easter Prayer.

Published: April 8, 2012 / Updated: April 9, 2012 Crystal god, medium

Editor’s note: This is the prayer I wrote for the Easter services at my church.

Dear Lord,

Today we remember your grace, mercy and love.
We remember your son, who you sent as our dove.

We reflect on the suffering he endured for our debt.
It’s gift that we pray we will never we forget.

Because we understand that our debt was substantial.
And we pray we will always be humbly grateful.

Jesus hung on the cross, and bleed for our sin.
He was beaten, and tortured and endured wounds on his skin.

But, the story, we know, didn’t end with the grave.
Instead, your son, the whole world he did save.

Through his resurrection, we gained access to eternal existence.
And suddenly your presence wasn’t at a great distance.

Jesus offered us all true unity with you.
And gave us a chance to each be made new.

So we rejoice, and shout: He is risen!
We are no longer bound by sin’s mighty prison!

But we also know that this world is still broken.
And that many have not yet heard the good news that’s been spoken.

So, we pray for the sick, the poor and the sad.
We pray for the lonely, the hungry, the mad.

We pray for the people who need it the most.
That they might be touched by your holy ghost.

We also, today, pray for the people who don’t think they need it all.
We know that prayer’s need is never that small.

And we pray for those who are still in the dark.
We ask that you’ll help them see your wrists, feel your marks.

Lord, we ask that they too can tap into your peace.
And truly understand that your love does not cease.

We pray that, like your son, we can be a light in the night.
We pray that as followers, we can shine even 1/100th as bright.

And, we ask all these things in Jesus’ name.
Because after He rose, everything changed.

Amen.