I posted Kate's article on a social experiment involving online dating sites and co-workers on The Brew. It's The Brew's way of saying, Happy Valentine's Day.
The Brew is getting bigger and bigger. I spent nearly all of my free time today online with posting new articles, answering and sending out emails and keeping up a good online presence. You think if I didn't have an actual physical body, I might exist only online.
What a thought.
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Upcoming movies I'm pumped about:
Blake Snake Moan: if someone turned a Flannery O'Conner story into a movie, it might look like this.
Sunshine: Brit director Danny "28 Days Later" Boyle's version of sci-fi.
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Another great Kierkegaard prayer from Provocations.
"Oh God, forgive me for seeking excitement and enjoyment in the allurements of the world which are never truly satisfying. If like the prodigal son, I have gone in search of the wonders of the transient world, forgive me, and receive me back again into your encircling arms of love."

Love and Chicago-Style in Dallas

In honor of Valentines's Day this week, The Brew is feature a three articles all on the subject of love, with the usual Brew style. First up is a penetrating look at abuse of the word love by Lonnie. Watch later this week for a social experiment involving co-workers at an online dating site and for finding where theology, love and ambiguity come together.
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Found a Chicago-style pizza place in Dallas. Chicago Rick's has a pretty decent pie. It's almost a light version of the real thing, with about half the crust and half the cheese, but still made upside down as it should be. I would've thought that Texans would've wanted a bigger, better, more gluttonous version of Chicago-style, but it seems that they can't even handle the real thing. So chalk one up for ol' Chi-town.
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The coffee-chain-that-shall-eternally-remain-nameless now only serves trans-fat free pastries. Including the silly cupcakes which are more trouble than they are worth, packaging-wise.
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Watched the painfully funny Series 2 of the Office this week. Sometimes the British-isms still needed translation but the awkwardness never does.

Other News

Ted Haggart finished a three-week rehab program. Read about it here. What's most interesting are the comments at the end of the article that show the worst of who we are.

In better news, I posted the first ambiguous article on the Brew. It's a great look at G.K. Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday, by Kevin.

Headline News

The Brew received around 11,400 page views in January, with 1,791 unique visitors. That's freakin' awesome. Word of mouth is picking up steam. If you like The Brew, join the blogring (xanga) or group (MySpace or Facebook) so others can hear about it. (That's my persuasive speech to ask you guys to help advertise The Brew for free.)

I posted this month's editorial on Ambiguity on The Brew. There's lot's of good stuff to come. An essay on The Man Who Was Thursday; confidence in ambiguity in on online dating site; Word abuse and the word 'love' becoming ambiguous; An Exercise in Ambiguity; Finding God in the Ambiguous Future; unclear occupation expectations for young single people in Evangelicalism. And more to come as well. If interested in writing, email eric@caffeinatedstudio.com.

I'm known at my church as 'that single guy from Chicago' to a growing number of people I have never met. The reason this is remarkable is because there are no other people from Chicago there.
Ha! I wish. A single guy at my small Dallas church is more the oddity than someone being from Chicago. I've fielded many a question like, "So what do you think about a singles ministry?"

A friend got me the first six Season 3 episodes of Lost, which I missed. I'm caught up now, both story-wise and it's-all-I'm-thinking-about-now-wise.

Was disappointed with the Superbowl. Bears had one good play but then went downhill after the first two minutes of the game.
Commercials? Anyone else yawn through them?

Chicago's temp today: 5 degrees (w/out windchill). Dallas: 64 degrees.

Who do you look like?

Writing...

Feb.'s come quickly.
I have an editorial and an article to write for The Brew.
I also volunteered to write four devotionals for my church's Lent Devotional book; and they're due on the 1st.
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Kevin's blog inspired me to share a recipe of my own.
This is a dessert you can get at that one coffee shop. The name has slipped from my memory for the moment but here's the recipe.

Gold Coast Tiramasu Wannabe
Get a French press of the Gold Coast Blend.
Get a slice of Marble Pound Cake.
Get a barista (who tows the company line of "Just Say Yes") to pour a shot of espresso over the pound cake.
Sip the Gold Coast and notice how well it pairs with the drenched pound cake.
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The film "Paradise Now" is intense, heartbreaking and beautiful.

Read this Kiekegaard quote this morning and couldn't stop thinking about it.

"It was said of Christ that he would reveal the thoughts of many hearts, and this he did. How? Simply by proclaiming grace. He who proclaims the law forces a person into something. People try to hide themselves when faced with the law. But grace, the fact that it is grace, makes them completely unconstrained. Face to face with grace a person really learns to know what lies deepest within. Tell a child to do something--this does not mean the child does it, nor do you really get to know the child's nature. No, but to say, "You are free, you may do as you please"--then you find out what lies deepest in the child." - Soren Kierkegaard's Notes and Journals.
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Beck's 'The Information' rocks the catskills.
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I posted my article on ending my newspaper career on The Brew. It's the first article I've posted to ever contain profanity.
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Beside the Oscars nominations being announced, the Razzie's were announced, too.

Subtle Nachos...

I watched "Nacho Libre" over the weekend. I was mildly surprised. All fart jokes aside, there was an odd subtlety that reminded me of the style of movies like "The Royal Tenenbaums". If you can believe it, the style and soundtrack were subtle, making it seem more than a little indie.
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I'm thinking of doing a Chicago vs. Dallas post.
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I posted a new author on The Brew: William Fortenberry writes on The Death of Ivan Illych. Check it out.

New Brew

I posted Dan's article on rethinking how one does church on The Brew.
I was hoping to go Chicago for Founder's Week this year but I ran out of money. Alistair Begg is preaching and that was the big draw for me. I can just taste a traditional Lou Malnati's slice. I can taste the smoothest mocha from Intelligentsia. Anyone's who still up there should grab one for me.

Winter in Texas

t's finally gotten into the 30s and 20s down here. I'm hoping for snow during a weekend-long rain storm. But everyone keeps laughing at me or saying, 'Keep hoping.'
Instead of snow, Texas only gets ice; making Southern drivers who don't know how to drive even worse. And I also find out that because of the inclimate weather, my church might cancel their services on Sunday.
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I posted my article on the end of Arrested Development on The Brew today. If you've never heard of the show, check out the article to get a glimpse.
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Another great waste of time is www.willitblend.com. The site it pretty self-explanatory an simple fun. The machines used in the videos are what are used to make Frappaccinos at the one coffee shop. You know the one.

Getting Busy

I'm starting to get busy again. It's been a while and I almost forgot what it was like. Gauging your time and seeing what you fit into a given day. I'm in a book club at church; helping lead a movie night and discussion for the college group at church; writing articles and organizing the magazine; etc. etc. It's almost like I'm back in school again.
Something that's taken up some of that time is www.freeshow.blogspot.com . Don't visit the site unless you want to waste some time.
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There's plenty more Brew articles coming for January. I just posted Jamie's article on losing a parent today. Many more are to come more frequently.

La Villita Drive-By - Real Crime Series

School had just let out in the Little Village neighborhood of Chicago and kids were walking home or taking buses. I was working in the press room that City News had at the Chicago Police Headquarters on the South Side. I had a computer monitor in front of me and two police radios squawking to my right.

Little Village, also known as La Vallita to it’s many Mexican residents, had many gangs, one of which reared its head that afternoon when someone shot a high school student walking with his girlfriend.

One of the police radios squawked up when the report came into Chicago’s 9-11 center. Person shot in the 3100 block of South Kedvale. I wrote down the address and then got online to check out the address at whitepages.com, a sort of online phonebook where you can put in a generic address, such as 3100 South Kedvale, and get all addresses and phone numbers to match.

I punch in the numbers and get around five addresses and phone numbers. I pick one that seems to be in the middle of the block and call them up. A middle-aged man answers the phone.

In as understanding a voice as I can muster, I tell him that I am a reporter from the City News Service of Chicago. Then I say that a shooting had occurred on his block and ask if he had seen or heard anything.

He pauses and then tells me that a kid was shot on his front lawn.

I can’t believe my luck. Sometimes people hang up on you or say they didn’t see anything. Or they answer the phone with “Bueno,” giving you the signal that they probably don’t speak English.

So I keep talking to him, asking questions and catching a great news story that just fell out of the sky.

Some vehicle drove down his street and shot the boy (what you have to call males under 18 in news copy) who was walking with his girlfriend. The boy fell onto the lawn of the homeowner, whose kids saw the shooting and then went outside to help. The father grabbed some towels and blankets to help the boy until the paramedics arrived.

Police and the fire department (which sends the paramedics and ambulances) came to question witnesses and help the boy. They talked to the girlfriend, the homeowner, his kids and other neighbors.

I asked the homeowner if his kids would be wiling to talk and, luckily, they were. I put on my “Sorry-to-have-to-do-this” voice and heard from a son and daughter what they saw. They heard a couple loud pops from a gun and then looked outside to see the boy fall into their yard. They told their dad what happened and were outside to help the boy and his girlfriend, who escaped unharmed.

The kids’ voices wavered while trying to tell me about all the blood. I held my bulky phone between my head and my shoulder while scribbling down all I could on some paper at my desk.

The dad was put back on the phone and told me about the girlfriend’s bookbag, which cops initially took as evidence but then tossed away near some garbage cans. He had picked this up to take it back to the girlfriend, who has since gone home.

Thinking quickly, I asked the dad if there was an ID card in the bookbag. He found one and read me the name and address of the girlfriend. I double checked this info with him and thanked him for all his help. To make me seem more caring of their situation, I told them that their info, which included a description of the vehicle the shooter rode in, would hopefully help catch the people who did this.

I then used the White Pages website to get the girlfriend’s phone number. An elderly lady answered and I gingerly asked if the girlfriend was there. I did another slow introduction and then asked if the girl could answer a few questions about the shooting. She declined, which I was fine with, having been able to talk to an eyewitness to the shooting.

This was one of around five times when a story fell in my lap or I was able to put together a great story.

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On a different note, I think I'm addicted to Facebook.

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The newest Brew article will be posted tomorrow; Lonnie wrote another amazing, beautiful and raw article. Check it out on Monday.

I'll putting together two articles for this month: one on the end of Arrested Development and on the end of my journalism career.

Add Another One To The Lists...

So I got a Facebook site today. It's pretty shnazzy, technologically speaking. So whenever I post here, it will automatically post the same thing on Facebook. Pretty cool, huh? I'd link to my site but I guess you have to have a Facebook to look at other's page. So if you have one, look me up.

As promised, the Real Crime Story is coming.

And I'm thinking of putting together a satire issue of The Brew in the near future. Any takers? Let me know. I'd like the issue to be sharp, and smart. Writing that is both of these is not easy to produce; nor does it come quickly. If interested, email me and let me know.

The inspiration for this is a book I'm reading: Serrated Edge. It's a biblical defense of satire. So all those who don't think this kind of writing appropriate, I stick my tongue out at you.

Fact or Fiction

I finally finished Tom Clancy’s Teeth of the Tiger over Christmas.

I was reading it on the flight to Ohio when the guy sitting next to me on the plane asked me if I was a Clancy fan. I told him I was a fan of how technical and elaborate his novels were. Once bit of chit chat led to another and the guy, named Matt, told me that he worked for the space intelligence department of the Air Force.

Now, having forsaken all my reporting instincts and put a lid on my curiosity, I merely sat back and listened to all kinds of interesting facts about space intelligence.

Matt pretty much sits at a computer and keeps up with what’s going on around Earth’s space. And naturally, since Matt was part of the intelligence community, there was only so much he could tell me. Any reasonable person, though could guess what his work covers.

One could guess that since there are millionaires now paying to get shot into space, then there is much more space activity going on in the private sector than is publicized. So our government needs people to keep track of it so that they can keep up with it. One could also guess that there is also much more going on at the international space station than is publicized.

One thing that Matt didn’t keep a secret was that the space intelligence community regularly sends things into space with shuttle launches. Although the launches usually take place very early in the morning, they are not a secret. Only the specific equipment sent up in those launches are kept secret.

A humorous side to the launch site in California is that the beaches near the launch site have been closed off to the public because a rare species of bird lay their eggs in the sand. Foot traffic on the beaches would crush the eggs, so says PETA. Some of the more militant PETA members have swam up to the beach to “protect” or protest any use of the surrounding areas. They were promptly arrested and charged with endangering wildlife, as well as trespassing.

Perhaps one of the craziest factoids I learned was about ICBMs (intercontinental ballistic missiles). The military test launches these missiles to remote islands in the Pacific. And, according to Matt, these missiles can reach anywhere in the world in about a half hour.

All this talk about intelligence made me wonder how much of Clancy’s novels were fiction. In Teeth Of The Tiger, a covert intelligence community is set up to accomplish what the CIA, FBI, NSA couldn’t. I wondered if Clancy’s novels became the what ifs that made the government think in a certain direction. An uncle of mine, who is a retired police officer and gun enthusiast, told me that Clancy spends so much time at the Library of Congress researching everything for his novels. Clancy has become so knowledgeable about the military, government and everything related to both that the U.S. hires him as a consultant.

And on a completely unrelated note, an older Clancy novel, Debt of Honor, published in the late 90s, seemed to eerily predict 9/11. At the end of the novel, a Japanese patriot flies a jet liner into Congress, killing most every elected official and leaving Clancy hero Jack Ryan to become president.

Creepy.

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I posted an article on bi-polar disorder by Sarah that defines potent last week on The Brew. I also posted an article by Trent that tries to create a position on mental health and spirituality that is in the middle. It’s worth a few reads (because after the initial read, most will be too pissed off to see the wisdom in it).

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I also updated The Beach Picayune so that you can look up posts by topic, making it easy to find older Real Crime Stories, posts about Clark Stacy or posts about depression. Check it out.

A Quickie

A Quickie
I had some Costa Rican coffee this week that was smoov as butta. Tasted like bittersweet cocoa and was delicious.
Also got a free sample to brew of some Ethiopia from Dunn Brothers Coffee. I had to compare it to the Ethiopia at the Coffee-Chain-That-Shall-Remain-Nameless, which I'm used to. The sample, which was not roasted as dark, had smack-you-in-the-face grapefruit flavor; the stuff I'm used to has more of a lemony flavor and an herbal smell.
And yeah, you really can get all this just from drinking coffee. Kinda like getting an earthy flavor or roundmouth feel in wine. And, yeah, 'roundmouth' is truly a word.
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I posted the full version of my article, Re-Entering the Faith, which I previewed this past week, on The Brew. I also posted an article by Lonnie Smith (Mishraile) on figuring out the balance of focusing on God and yourself when trying to heal from a mental health issue. It's pretty solid.
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I'm working up another Real Crime Series installment about a drive-by in Chicago that I covered. I updated to the beta version of Blogspot and began categorizing the blogs so you can look up certain ones by theme. For a listing of all the Real Crime series, check out the "Coming Soon" post from Feb. 10, '06.

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Watched the first disc of 30 Days, a tv series by Morgan Spurlock of Supersize Me fame. Pretty well done. The episode on Muslims in America (Disc 1) is certainly worth a view.

Pho For All

Had some amazing pho (pronounced 'fa') today after church. It's about the third or fourth meal at a Vietnamese restaurant since I moved here. And there seems to be no shortage of Vietnamese restaurants around the NW Dallas area.

I found out that during the Vietnamese war, Dallas was one of the cities that they evacuated Vietnamese people to. Apparently they settled down in and around Richardson, TX (near NW suburb of Dallas) and there's plenty of restaurants.

My buddy and I were the only white people in there for a while (which means you're in the right place for real Vietnamese food). I had some great coffee, which they drip-brew in a small cup at the table. The coffee drips through a small filter onto a bunch of sweetened, condensed milk, which you mix together while it's warm and then pour over ice. Oooohhh, is it good.

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Got a little frazzled this weekend over Christmas plans. And then I realized that I write best while I'm frazzled, pissed off or depressed. Realized that I hadn't worked on my novel for a while, either; it's probably because I hadn't been frazzled, pissed off or depressed enough recently.

So I stopped by the DPL and picked up some music to help me write. I found Eminem's Curtain Call; Foo Fighter's There is Nothing Left To Loose; and Elliot Smith's From a Basement On The Hill. We'll see what happens. Maybe I'll finish the chapter I started six months ago.

Thanksgiving and The Brew

So I know it’s been a long time coming but I’m finally writing about my drive to Ohio and back for Thanksgiving. But, hey, you can’t rush perfection.

So here goes.

So there were three nuns in a van driving down I-40 in Tennessee.
No.
Really.

They were behind me in traffic for about a half hour while driving up on Nov. 22. That’s when I got out my digital tape recorder from my reporting days to entertain myself on the trip. “A van full of nuns is tailgaiting me…I just passed a brown pickup truck with a fish symbol on the back and…Oh crap! The nuns just ran him off the road. Well, not really. But that would be something to see.”

The nuns stayed behind me for a while but then passed me going about 90 m.p.h. “I’m sure they’re [passing me] ‘cause they know they can get away with it. They’ll get pulled over and say, ‘Oh, I’m sorry. How fast were we going? My speedometer’s on kilometers because that’s how it is in Rome’ or something like that. I’m sure that’s how they get out of it. Or like, ‘Son, have you been going to church? Or blah, blah, blah.’”

Other religious experiences on the trip included passing a white church van emblazoned with the words, “Special Forces for Jesus Ministries.” It was as real as the nuns going 90.

Driving through Tennessee was the highlight and downside to the trip. On the drive up, I counted 17 Tennessee State Troopers between Memphis and Nashville.
17.

Traffic also sucked on the way up because I hit Nashville about 5 p.m. (this was after leaving Dallas at 6:30 a.m.). Yeah. I was about ready to call it quits then. But I plowed on, frazzled and cussing at rush-hour traffic for the next two hours. Some clips from the tape recorder would not be suitable for this blog.

But driving back through The Big T on the way home was great. I enjoyed the Smoky Mountains and the fall colors, all while listening to the O, Brother Were Art Thou soundtrack. That was ideal.

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The Dec. issue of the Brew is up and running. I posted an editorial on Mental Health and Spirituality tonight, with an article by Lana Wood to come in a few days. You can still submit article for Dec. Go to www.thebrewmag.com and click on the ‘Contribute’ link at the bottom of the page.

Consolidating...

So I started a Myspace account to help promote The Brew. That makes my blogs three-strong and me content-weak. So I'm not going to try to keep up three (which means neglecting one or the other to maintain them all) but post the same things on all of them.
So if you don't like blogger, I'm at
www.xanga.com/sonofa3

www.myspace.com/sum

And coming soon, how I fared whiled driving to Ohio for Thanksgiving.

Giving Up On Answers and Suspending Judgment

I finished God in the Dark by Os Guiness this week and was humbled and changed. Reading Guiness’ answer to the question of ‘Why, O Lord?’ put something into words that I had been struggling with for a while. It was an idea that helped me deal with the suicide of a friend a year and a half ago.

Clark Stacy killed himself in March of ’05 while I was still a crime reporter in Chicago. Two years prior at Moody, I was his resident assistant but kept up with him after I graduated. I was naturally shocked when I heard the news on my way to work the overnight shift.

During a lull around 2 a.m., I did what I could to corroborate the news. I found online the small newspaper in Tennessee that ran his obituary the day after the suicide. I instantly thought of what I could do to find out more. I could look up the local medical examiner, hospital, or sheriff’s office. A friend had called me to fill me in but any news story had to be corroborated. I had to get the facts myself.

An hour later, I realized that I wouldn’t be able to get any info. Why would anyone from small-town Tennessee talk to some small newswire reporter from Chicago? And if this was a suicide, no one would be talking about it anyway. I considered all the other roadblocks to getting information. I also considered my need to direct a sole reporter to best cover the city for the next 7 hours.

I stopped trying to find answers through reportorial means. Instead, for about two months I turned to the community that he and I used to be part of: Moody Bible Institute. I went to a sort of memorial chapel, talked to his friends still there and then listened to some crazy drama involving professors at MBI and Clark’s parents.

The man who counseled Clark at MBI was just as dumbfounded. I didn’t ask but the counselor gave me his professional opinion (which I wasn’t going to ask about for obvious reasons). I felt privileged that he told me what he did but I still didn’t couldn’t figure out why it all happened.

More months went by and I gave up trying to find answers. My anger burned out and I knew that I would never have the answer that I wanted. I was just going to have to accept that and, somewhere in the back of my head, try to accept that God was all that I was taught he was.

And then comes Guiness to tell me this:
“It is difficult to hold an impersonal universe personally responsible, and nothing less than personal responsibility will do. The only remaining option is to call God to the bar and charge him with the injustice of suffering that is otherwise inexplicable. Through doubt we can get even with God.”

So where does that leave me? What am I to do? Believe that God is good?

Guiness told me that “To suspend judgement on why something is happening is not the same as denying that something is happening. The former is faith, the latter is repression, which should have not part in the Christian faith.”

His idea is that you don’t know why but you can know why you trust God who knows why. You suspend judgment of God who knows why.

Guiness concludes by stating that all doubts about the Father are silenced in the Son, to which no suffering can be compared.

There’s not much to say after that.

The Brew Served Up

So I moved down here to Texas to try to start some kind of publication with a buddy of mine from college. It's coming together nicely and (if I haven't already mentioned it to you) it is called The Brew.
You can check out the finished product at www.thebrewmag.com when it served up on Nov. 1. (Right now the website is a just a possible logo).
We have all the articles in for the inaugural issue, which features the topic of boredom. The magazine will make money online by people visiting it. So if you like what you read, visit it more or tell others. You can respond to articles, visit contributor weblogs, even by The Brew T-shirts and memorabilia.

Here's a sample of an article I wrote for it on boring people.

So I tried a drink the other day called Sparks. The orange, extreme-looking can boasted itÂ’s ingredients in bold lettering easily read from far away: Premium Malt Beverage With Caffeine, Taurine, Energeene, Awakeene and Yellow Number Five. It seemed oxymoronic to have both a stimulant and a relaxant in the same drink. So what would the result be with both of these in your system? WouldnÂ’t each of the opposing ingredients cancel out the effects of the other? Would you feel relaxed as you stayed up all night to finish that magazine article that is due in the morning? Would you be rehearsing various ultimate Frisbee plays while trying to say the alphabet backwards?

I wanted a little adventure in my life so I closed my eyes and stepped out into the perilous unknown that this beverage represented. I didnÂ’t know if IÂ’d bask in the rich flavor of the energy drink or scrub my tongue to destroy every molecule of malt. I was ready for whatever may come because I knew that it wouldnÂ’t be the end of the world. My life would still go on after the can was empty and my stomach a little fuller. I may be wiser for having guzzled some disgusting combination that nature would never dare to bring together. Or I may discover the perfect liquid indulgence that would calm me down after a hard day of work but conversely propel me into a long night of writing.

IÂ’m realizing more and more that I am one of those restless kind of people. They donÂ’t like getting into ruts or being in the same place for very long. It may have something to do with me being born in between May 21 and June 21 or it could just be me always being curious about how things could be different. Either way, I like testing things out and trying something new.

I like knowing people that also are in motion and up for something different or adventurous. Seeing others move forward challenges me to keep up; not for competitionÂ’s sake but in order to get to where theyÂ’re at. And because of this, IÂ’m not fond of those who arenÂ’t moving forward or are not adventurous, especially in their faith. It irritates me to be around stagnant people, mainly because I used to be one.