Hey--
Just was wondering if any of you out there know of a good online daily devotional. I had one that I found a few years ago called Soul Journey, but it has since discontinued. I have thought about trying to find a site with a daily dose of "My Upmost for His Highest" but I wanted to see if there were any other good ones out there that you my friends know about??

I like to start my day off with a little bit of God's word... even if it's just a bite :-)

Happy Friday everyone!

My Points Rant

Ok... so, I am an avid technology girl. I work in the web design world and create artistic "havioc" on many. That being said.. I HATE spam, pop-ups, ads with sounds that you don't ask for, and banner ads that try to take over your screen. So... don't worry, I don't associate myself with any of those.

Anyway, this post is just to brag a little big about this cool program I have been involved in for a few years called My Points. For those of you who have no idea what it is, it is a company where just by shopping online, reading email, playing games and taking surveys you can earn rewards like gift cards, airline miles and vacations. Over the past 3 years I've gotten about $75 in gift cards to Barnes and Nobel, and a few gift cards to Target.

If you are an online shopper this program rocks because for participating stores you get so many points for every dollar you spend. Now, even if you AREN'T a big online shopper, you STILL get 5 points for every email you "read" and visit the participating site. That is how I have gotten most of my points.

Now.. If you don't like getting random email, well, this program may not be for you... BUT if you enjoy free stuff (and really, who doesn't) you may want to give it a try!

Let me know, and if I "recommend" you, we both can earn extra points. :) sweet. I just figure if you find something cool, why not share it with your friends.

Check it out here!

Random Tuesday

Today totally surpassed yesterday, not like anything grand happened to make note of-- but it wasn't a Monday, and life wasn't so aggravating.

That being said... here are just some random things from today...

• A band I really like-- The Juliana Theory-- is calling it quits.

• My favorite operating system has anticipated that hackers would try to crack it-- so the programmers have embedded a warning deep in the software — in the form of a poem. This totally sounds like something I would do ;-) For those of you who are to lazy to read the article, here is the poem.

"Your karma check for today: There once was a user that whined/his existing OS was so blind/he'd do better to pirate/an OS that ran great/but found his hardware declined./Please don't steal Mac OS!/Really, that's way uncool./(C) Apple Computer, Inc."

•• So I work in the automotive industry... this blog has some pretty sweet cars, especially the one that looks like a rubiks cube!! (had to share)

ok.. 3 is all ya get for today.. I could go on--because I'm just that random-- but I will conserve my random stash as to not overwhelm you! Plus figure skating is on...

Hey-- tomorrow is Wednesday... already half way through the week! W00t!

today needs to be forgotten forever.
it was just one of those days that i wish never happened.
yeah.... it was a monday all the way through.

*sigh. going to bed.

glad to have made it through.
glad to throw this stone away.

Extremes

Ok.. so I'm "stealing" someone elses blog post from a few months ago, but it really mirrors what I've been thinking-- especially with a site Stephen pointed out yesterday, so I figured I would share it with you all...
It's from the blog of "The Crooked Saint" (he seems to have dropped off blogging for the past few months.. maybe because of his recent decision to go to seminary, but I can't really speculate because I just stumbled apon his blog today) I just love the blogging world. It can be both frusterating, and invigurating-- make us angry, and open our minds... and you can just meet all sorts of people.
ok.. nough said.. here's the post... seriously, let me know what you think about it....

"Here are a couple topics floating around the blogs I frequent.

Cussing:
One camp thinks no truly saved person will cuss. If someone cusses, they are not a Chrstian
The other camp thinks dropping F-bombs and cussing in general doesn't reflect any spiritual deficiency.

Rock Music:
One camp thinks the devil created the drum and rock music as a form of music is un-redeemable
The other camp rocks and rolls all night and parties every day.

Scripture:
One camp: Inerrant and easy to understand. There is a prescription for everything.
The other camp: Scripture as allegory and useful, but not the final authority

Emergent Church:
One camp: Lucifer's children
The other camp: The only way to reach the world.

I think people grossly underestimate God. To me, it's reasonable to accept the inerrancy of Scripture and also throw up my hands at times and say "I don't know how to read this passage."
I think we should thoughtfully choose our words, but I can't in good conscience say someone who uses the "S" word is incapable of a relationship with Christ.

I think we should always be thinking of ways to reach the world for Christ...but I can't throw out thousands of years of Church tradition...nor can I let that tradition keep me from reaching the lost.

And rock music: Oh my, I would be a shell of a person without it.

I won't point you to any websites. I'm finding myself spending way too much time debating things like this with people who do not have ears to hear. I wouldn't want anyone reading this to fall prey to the time-robbers.

I know this for sure (and I'm stealing this line) There is a God. I am not Him. Thanks be to God for grace through Christ because there's no way I'll know everything in this life."

Monkeyin around

In tunes news... the No. 1 album of the week is Jack JohnsonÂ’s soundtrack to the “Curious George” movie. People are acting all suprised or something, but I say, dude, it's Jack Johnson.. why are you suprised?! That guy, in my personal opinion, rocks!

Wack Wednesday-- USB drives

Ok.. so this site is just plan goofy... and for a "geek" like me it just makes me smile. For those of you living in the "dark" ages USB drives are a bit like the "floppy disks" of old... but you can save waaaaaaaaaaaay more than 1.34 MB of data on them. Actually, I just bought one that is a whole 1 GB. And yeah, it is only about the size of a tube of chapstick! So check it out. My personal favs are the thumb drive and the barbie one! :)

L-o-v-e

1 Corinthians 13...

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails.
...
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

_____________________________________
We love because he first loved us.
1 John 14:9

San Fran Adventure

Yay! I FINALLY have some good quality time to post pictures from my San Fran Trip... so here is a little walk through my adventure....

Day 1
Leave nice and early from the South Bend Airport... I love flying west because it's like you get to fly back through time and get 3 "free" hours. I arrived with pleanty of time to do stuff all afternoon. Too bad I brough the bad weather with me. I was hoping for more sun!
Saturday night I had to stay in a hotel that I paid for out of my own pocket, so I went all out and found this sweet little hotel on expedia. It was a little hole in the wall with pleanty of charm. Perfect for the art "geek" in me.

It seriously was like staying in an art museum. Different sytles of art lined the hallways.

All the rooms were painted by different local artists with different "themes." Some of them were REALLY out there, and others were crazy fun.

My first room was SOOOO boring (it only had a few graphic pictures on the wall) so I nicely requested to see if I could move to a different room. (the guy across the cort-yard from me had this HUGE peacock on his wall, and I was jealous!) so they put me in this fun room with cartoons on the wall. haha. It made me smile.

Just down the street from my hotel was the entrance to China Town... so you can guess where I spent a lot my my afternoon. You got to love all the cheap and fun gifts you can get there, plus it was Chinese New Year... too much fun.

I asked the gal at the front desk of the hotel what spots I had to see while i was in town and she suggested Haight and Ashbury. This is the "hippie" section of town... a place where people like Jimmy Hendricks emerged from. Drank lots of coffee and meet some REALLY amazingly interesting people here. It was just nice to get out of the rain.

Day 2

Got up early. Yay for sunshine!! Off to Peir 39. Caught the first ferry to "the Rock." (aka Alkatraz Island) You have no idea how excited I was because many people told me that you had to buy your tickets early-- I guess that is the good thing about going during the "off" turist season!

AH! Somebody let me out of here! Oh wait.. I PAID to be here. *sheesh*
Phew.. I broke out of prison just in time...
After I got back to Peir 39 I went to check out the "mob" of sealions that have been living there since the big earthquake in 89. It was INSANE. (and smelled a lot like fish)

I wanted to sing the Rice-o-roni song. These things are a lot of fun.. especially when you are flying down a huge hill!!
Speaking of hills... uh, or something-- this is the "crooked-ist" street in the world. Lombard Street.
If you are in San Francisco, you HAVE to visit the Golden Gate Bridge... although it is definitely NOT golden. It's more of a redish color to be exact.
I was crazy and walked across the whole thing. Yeah, I did a LOT of walking while I was out there... It was sooo pretty.
I'm an arsty gal.. so you know I had some fun pics :)

Day 3

I moved into my new "posh" hotel. The beautiful Crown Royal. They supposedly didn't have enough single king sized beds, so I ended up in a room with two queens. Yeah, let me tell you that I had fun jumping on them BOTH~ haha!
Fun costum for a bell hop.

This is where the real WORK began... conference every day from 9-5:30. It was really interesting and I learned way too much. It's amazing that when you are doing something that you actually like, time just seems to fly by... in the evenings I still got to have fun though.
I really wanted to see the Pacific Ocean (I was in California afterall!!) so one evening after the conference I walked to the sea... I wish somebody would have told me the map wasn't really to scale and missing some roads before I walked TWENTY plus blocks!! lol.. yeah, the things you will do when you are desperate. :-D

Day 4

More conference stuff.
Went to go see the Oakland Bay Bridge. It was much prettier at night than the golden gate.

Day 5

Ok-- my camera started going crazy this night, so I only got one picture!! And that was of the yummy Ghirardelli square (where all the chocolate used to be made before they moved to a bigger location) I got to eat at a really nice resturant with my other designer friend that went with me and took the trolly the peir, walked through art galleries, and just enjoyed my last night in the city.

Day 6

Got up at 4am local time, and flew back to good ol South Bend. Yeah, total travel day. One highlight was flying into Detroit... they were all getting pumped up for the upcoming Super Bowl. woohoo. That was pretty crazy. It was one long day though.

All in all, great way to spend my first business trip. I learned a lot and had a great time! (bonus!) Life can just be too cool sometimes. Ok.. this post is FOREVER long enough... I'm out! Hope you enjoyed the pics... might post a few more later.

Looking for a few good books...

I went to the Chicago Auto show today with my brother. It was SWEET. Saw a lot of really cool cars.. and a few really ugly ones too! ha. More about that later... cause my brain still hurts from the car stimulation over-kill! (think one too many large screen tvs, bright flashy things, chrome wheels, rotating kiosks.. yeah, you get the idea)

I had a question though.. be for I sign off..

What, if anything, have you been reading these days? Or what have you read in the past few months that you really liked and would recommend?? Yeah.. I'm looking for a few good books-- as my "to read" list is getting short at the moment. Now that I am finally out of college where I was "forced" to read what they wanted us too, I am enjoying the freedom of exploring new books.. so any recommendations you have are appreciated!!

*Yawn*

Ok.. I am a podcast freak.. maybe it's because I am a computer geek, maybe I just love itunes, maybe because I'm always on the lookout for new music, or maybe it's because I just love that anyone can have their own "radio show". Yeah. Trust me, they are addicting. Anyway, I just wanted to feature one that I have really been enjoying. It's called The Bored Again Christian ad it plays a lot of different Christian music that you don't normally hear on any other christian radio stations around here (ug.. I could have some comments about that, but i'm going to let it go for now) Stuff from The Elms, Starflyer 59, The Danielson Famile, Kids in the Way, Pedro the Lion, Eisley, Sufjan Stevens, Pushstart Wagon plus lots more. Check it out!!

So yeah. I'm working on the computer all day, so podcasts are my friends. errr. or something like that.

My Jesus

The other day I heard this song on the radio and it really struck a chord with me.. let me share the lyrics with you...

My Jesus-- Todd Agnew

Which Jesus do you follow?
Which Jesus do you serve?
If Ephesians says to imitate Christ
Then why do you look so much like the world?

Cause my Jesus bled and died
He spent His time with thieves and liars
He loved the poor and accosted the arrogant
So which one do you want to be?

Blessed are the poor in spirit
Or do we pray to be blessed with the wealth of this land
Blessed are they that hunger and thirst for righteousness
Or do we ache for another taste of this world of shifting sand

Cause my Jesus bled and died for my sins
He spent His time with thieves and sluts and liars
He loved the poor and accosted the rich
So which one do you want to be?

Who is this that you follow
This picture of the American dream
If Jesus was here would you walk right by on the other side
or fall down and worship at His holy feet

Pretty blue eyes and curly brown hair and a clear complexion
Is how you see Him as He dies for Your sins
But the Word says He was battered and scarred
Or did you miss that part
Sometimes I doubt we'd recognize Him

Cause my Jesus bled and died
He spent His time with thieves and the least of these
He loved the poor and accosted the comfortable
So which one do you want to be?

Cause my Jesus would never be accepted in my church
The blood and dirt on His feet would stain the carpet
But He reaches for the hurting and despised the proud
I think He'd prefer Beale St. to the stained glass crowd
And I know that He can hear me if I cry out loud

I want to be like my Jesus!
I want to be like my Jesus!

Not a posterchild for American prosperity, but like my Jesus
You see I'm tired of living for success and popularity
I want to be like my Jesus but I'm not sure what that means
to be like You Jesus
Cause You said to live like You, love like You but then You died for me
Can I be like You Jesus?
I want to be like my Jesus

What does Jesus look like to YOU??
And what does following him REALLY look like?

ever have a night where you just can't sleep?!
to many thoughts running around in my brain....

boy, am I going to pay for this tomorrow.

*sigh*

Homelessness

They are everywhere... on the street corners, in the alley-ways, sleeping on a hill in the park. I know there is homelessness in SB, but maybe I don't notice it as much because it isn't to the magnitude as it is here. There is even homelessness in other big cities like Chicago, but maybe the weather is a lot less of a pain, so most of them thing San Fran is a better place to be. I guess I just have been really struggling this week with the in your face problem of homelessness and the fact that I just feel so helpless against it. Questions just keep hitting me-- like what can I personally do to make a difference? How can I love like Jesus? I guess what is hard for me is the massiveness of the problem-- even if I WERE to give ever homeless guy a quarter I wouldn't have enough!! They would just keep coming.... so what do you do? It is hard to just walk buy.... *sigh* So many questions.... life just seems to be full of them.

Ok.. back to my conference... catch ya later!

soooo... I didn't think I would get to post at ALL this week, and perhaps after this I won't be able to.. but I'm standing here in a most BEAUTIFUL Apple Store, typing away on a BEAUTIFUL Mac... and my world is good.
Just a few highlights to share with you so far
*China Town in San Fran is about 3 times as big as the one in Chicago.. but after awhile all the stores feel the same... still.. a great place to get cheap cute gifts for your family.
* I met a REAL hippie tonight when I ventured to Height and Ashbery (the place where Jimmy Hendrix and other of their kind originated from) and dude.. you can totally buy bong pipes here!
* The hotel that I am staying at tonight is practically an art mueseum! Every room is painted a different theme, and there are works of art hanging all through the halls. It is AMAZING!
* It's been raining all day. My shoes are squishy.
* Public Transportation CAN be amazing...
* I saw 4 monks today.
* There are a lot of homeless people. I pray for them when I see them. They are so in need of a savior. I even saw a guy with this huge hole in the side of his face. Sometimes this world breaks my heart.
* I need to learn how to tell DIRECTIONS!!!

Hopefully tomorrow will be nicer so that I can go to Alcatraz Island and Fisherman's Warf. I think that would be amazing.
Ok... time is limited, and my feet hurt (and are still squishy from the rain) so I think this is all for now. I may or may not have more time later to post or maybe not. Hey, at least now I know where I can find free internet. sweeeeeeet!

(ps, sorry for bad spelling.. for some reason the spell check tool is missing on my tool bar... weird)

I left My heart in San Francisco... or so the song goes

Well people.. it's official... by the time most of you read this I will either be in the air, or already in sunny San Francisco. Well, maybe it won't be sunny, but at least it will be about 20 degrees warmer than it is here, and that has GOT to count for SOMETHING! So yeah. It is going to be a lot of fun, and well, pretty sweet. Two fun days, three conference days, and one travel back home day. Craziness. I will take lots of pictures for you all, and I'm looking forward to catching up on all the blogs and myspaces when I get back.

Until then... cheerio.

The "new" Jen

So... this post is mostly for the people who don't live around here and haven't had a chance to see my new "do" :) I've been meaning to post these for awhile now... Yes, they really did cut about 12 inches off... and no, I really wasn't that sad to see it go. Sometimes change is good. Its cool to think that some little kid is going to be running around with MY hair-- Locks of Love is such a cool thing.

So... I've been thinking.. I still have all these pics from the Passion 06 Conference that I would like to put up here... and I still kinda want to blog about it, even though it happened a few weeks ago during my "no blog" period of life... do you think it would be ok and "cheat" and go back in time to make it up???

Wicked Wednesday-- DDR Resurrection

Yes... it's back.. and as bad as EVER! I know some of you out there have been missing my wacky/wicked Wednesday posts... so here is an exeptionally good one for you.

So, some of you may know that I am an avid Dance Dance Revolution fan. I have it for my PS, my xbox and now I even have it on my computer(over 600 songs buddy!) You would think I would be AMAZING at it now, but alas, I still have no cordination! ha! It's just a whole lot of fun, and really good exercise if you stick with it. It is great for parties and get-togethers.

Anyway... the site of the day.. a goofy satire site for my favorite video game... note, this IS a joke, and not real. I just HAD to share...

check it out HERE. (I especially like the "screenshots" of the results)

Blogger Blues

Ok.. so as many of you know, I haven't been around much in the "bloggisphere" since the beginning of this year. Now.. it's not like I've just had the most boring of life-- actually, quite the opposite. I guess I've just had a blogger "block". I want to blog, but I just CAN'T. It's like I'm stuck behind this wall. Weird. i know. Maybe it's the winter blahs- maybe I've just been working so hard at work and have had so many projects that I don't have time to mess around there, and by the time I get home at night the very LAST think I want to do is look at another computer (I'm with Jeanna on this one.. sometimes I just want to drop-kick the darn things, and I am supposed to LIKE them!) ahhhhhhhhhhh! ok there. I got it out. I'm feeling better. Time to get back in the groove.

oops. then I'm taking a trip and will be gone for a week. I guess this "grooviness" will have to start when I get back huh?

I really have missed you all. trust me.