Three Ways

Straight to the point, here are three highly probable ways that will end my life this year.

1. Motorcycles.

I used to own a motorcycle that I really loved. It was the essence of everything I wanted. Superbly engineered, a machine crafted to the highest standards. It looked bold and outstanding and fit into my

personality perfectly. My purchasing processes is based 90% on looks and 10% on performance. So I was almost completely satisfied but there was still exactly 10 percent longing for something more.

Recently several well placed events occurred which offered myself the opportunity to sell the bimmer for something new and exciting. I did not realize that something new and exciting would equal something mind blowing and gorgeous and outrageous. Here is what I got...

and no you don't have to agree with me

on all my statements but for me this is pure love. All kinds of crazy engineering like a dry clutch and desmodromic valves combined

with 94hp of twin L furry make for one awesome machine. Long story short, this thing is fast and....well.....

2. Electricity

I'm now a journeyman electrician and although I don't really know how much my responsibilities will change, it is quite possible that I will have to do more "responsible" work. Not like I haven't already terminated 115 000 volt transformers but who knows what else will lie in my electrical journeys. The industry is continually improving there safety measures and means of isolation the danger from the worker so this way is most unlikely to highly improbable. But still possible...

3. Falling from great heights

This summer will definitely mark the achievement of my life long goal to be a pilot. With the license comes the opportunity to constantly be living in the skies. Such a splendid and wondrous place I wish to share it with everyone I know. With great heights comes great falls. And although I am an excellent pilot ;) my life insurance provider seems to think that there is great risk involved.

Top 3 of 2009

Throughout my life I have had some fairly definitive moments and it seems as every year goes by life become even more special than the last. This year in particular has been one of my most favorites.


Uno uno uno!

"This is how it works:
You're young until you're not,
You love until you don't,
You try until you can't;
You laugh until you cry,
You cry until you laugh,
And everyone must breathe
Until their dying breath...
No, this is how it works:
You peer inside yourself,
You take the things you like,
And try to love the things you took;
And then you take that love you made,
And stick it into some
Someone else's heart,
Pumping someone else's blood --
And walking arm in arm,
You hope it don't get harmed,
But even if it does
You just do it all again..."
— Regina Spektor

Without a doubt, hands down, the best thing to go down in the year 2009 was Regina Spektor at the Orpheum. The days and events surrounding the concert with filled with great fellowship and awesome food ex. lamb burgers and Granville Island Winter Ale. But seeing Regina in person, hearing her voice, and watching her lips sing the songs that sink deep into my soul was immensely awesome. I can definitely see myself heading to far off places just to see this lovely lady again.


Deux
"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered."
- GK Chesterton
I will gander that I have more adventures this year then ever before. My number two of 2009 consists of the following adventures.


1. Flying across Alberta solo
2. My two weeks at Living Springs Bible Camp
3. Driving to Alaska
4. Back-country snowshoeing

Within those adventures I've managed to gain some pretty awesome skills and scares. Learning to fly a plane, check. Getting your campers to like the floor and eat moths, check. Getting a hook smashed into your face while fishing for salmon is Alaska, check. Getting away from it all by traversing a snowing mountain, check.








Numero Tres.

Surfing is something that I always thought was the coolest thing you could do. I love the ocean. It is so powerful and mysterious. It scares the crap out of me and gives me great peace. Though I had been surfing at Tofino I knew I wasn't really experiencing the stoke that surfers talk about. I had never been able to ride the clean part of a wave. I always caught the white wash. Now there is nothing wrong with riding white wash expect that it's dirty and loud and really not very cool. So in order to achieve the stoke I headed to Costa Rica for two weeks.

Perhaps one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. The beaches, waves, and people are extremely beautiful. Although everyone on the trip wasn't there to surf, I was. I woke at sunrise put on my SPF 60 and hit the beach. For the 10 days of actual surfing I figure I averaged over 8 hours a day in the water. Learning to surf was extremely frustrating. The constant battering of the waves. Your mouth and throat raw from the salt water. Constant gagging making you wish for just a single drop of fresh water. Finally making past the break I would just sit there probably for hours trying to recoup and line up for a set. Always in the wrong spot at the wrong time, I would miss wave after wave. Finally catching one I would eat ocean sooner than a jelly fish. This struggle went one for about 8 days. Each day I got better but also more and more frustrated.

With only one or two days of surfing left I began to feel as though I would never catch a wave. Through what was surely a miracle I saw myself in what seemed like the perfect spot for an oncoming set. I quickly turned my board and began paddling. The large lump of water was soon right behind me and it felt like I was about to fall down a ten story building. I pushed myself up and stood on the board. It felt like I was going 100mph the wind rushing past and everything going by in a blur. All of a sudden everything went quite, all things in my mind became focused and it felt like perhaps I just died. I don't know how else to describe that feeling. I don't know how exactly a piece of foam and energy can deliver such a feeling but i'm sure when God created this world He knew very well what hidden secrets the waves would give to His people.

Been a while

It's been a while since my last post eh? I have tried to "blog" but just haven't been in the mood. I haven't been in the mood for a lot of things. My job has consumed so much of me, that i don't know what I am apart from it. I don't choose to be a workaholic but the current situation allows me to work out of town 10 out of 14 days. Working out of town provides a substantial increase in income but it takes a toll on my spiritual and social life. I really miss my friends, even just seeing them.
This summer is a mixed bag of happenings. I have several wedding to attend, one of them being my mothers. A 10 day road trip on my new motorcycle. I saw an article on some of the roads in Washington and decided that I should experience them for myself. I hope to hit up the island and play some disc golf on Thetis and then make a dream come true by riding my bike to Tofino. Of course there will be a lot a hanging out with my west coast amigos.
Basically things are alright for me, i wish that i was of the loftier sort right now, but i'm not and i know it. If you would like to pray that i get some direction in this area, it would be much appreciated.
Till next time my friends,

Darren

My Man Weekend

This past weekend I had the chance to do some very manly things. First off, I went "wheeling" with my friend Mark. Mark is a member of the Edmonton Jeep Club and they organized this rally to go up to Ruby Falls. We left at 5 in the morning and spent the whole day driving up awesome trails and having a whole lot of fun. Mark's jeep did impressively well. Several other jeeps got really stuck and had break downs but it was anything the hard core wheelers couldn't handle.




Then to add to the testosterone, we went skeet shooting on Sunday. This is something that I imagined as being stupendously fun because, A: it involves guns, B: you shoot at things flying through the air, and C: what's better then shooting things with shotguns. My friend Dan and I split a box of 100 rounds and by the end of that my shoulder was pretty sore. Skeet shooting is ridiculously fun and I think i'm gonna have to get myself a shotgun. Haha.

Daily Bread

Today I ate seven slices of bread, two for my morning peanut butter and jam sandwich, two for my crunchy peanut butter on toast at coffee break, one slice of toast to go with my lunch, and two more crunchy peanut butters for my afternoon coffee. According to my loaf, that is half. I find that you can't go wrong with toast. As I have previously stated, I really like toast. But surprisingly with all this bread consumption I haven't been consuming much Jesus. I get these little urges to pray or read or to do anything but sit on the computer or watch tv, but it doesn't take much for them to go away. Then I wonder why I can't feel Him, or why it doesn't seem like anything is happening. I make up ideas that I'm in a low point of my spiritual walk and soon I'll be climbing back up that mountain really experiencing truth and peace. But really, I'm lying to myself and I'm lying to those around me. Sure I believe at one point I might have been a bit low, but I choose to become comfortable with that low, and made excuses so that I could stay at that low. I really don't feel like putting the effort in to get out of this low. I find it hard to believe that after all the blessing and amazing things the Lord has done for me, that this is the attitude that I now have. I feel like if I just had one good revelation, or one sudden shock of truth, that it would jolt me back on course. But that is all to easy, and I know it. I can always wait for it, but I might be waiting forever. So this realization that I am now writing about is really a message from God from myself saying "Hello Dayron, I'm here but I'm waiting for you. You need to make the choice. This is not how I want you to be. Seek Me and know Me." Perhaps you could pray that I choose Him instead of me, I don't know what that choice will mean and I'm a little scared. And even though there are hard and confusing times, I'm sure glad there's more to life than toast.

Super Quiz

Your results:
You are Superman

Superman 100% Catwoman 100% Supergirl 100% Wonder Woman 100% Spider-Man 100% Hulk 100% The Flash 100% Green Lantern 100% Iron Man 100% Robin 80% Batman 80%

You are a samurai. You are the best, most awesome and have uber hacking skills.

Click here to take the Superhero Personality Quiz

Homemade Deliciousness

Here are a couple of movies I helped make at school last year. I'll try and get the other Youth Retreat ones up in a bit.

CHBC Youth Retreat 06 - Movie 1


Fisherman's Friend

Wow

I don't know how exactly I stumbled across Regina Spektor, but am I ever glad I did. I think I was watching music videos on Bravo TV, which has some really good selections if you get that channel. So I was watching this interesting videos, probably meant to be watched on crack or something, when this one came on that particularly caught my attention. Her voice was that of an angel and the video added a mysterious delight to her lyrical chorus. Her song was simple yet complex. Light yet dark. Amazing yet even more amazing. I didn't even realize what I was in for till I made it to her website. I then found the music video to Fidelity, instantly I was in love. I don't know if this has ever happened to me before. I mean Kelly is good but Regina is just, wow. Her music has connected to my inner core and that's the way I like my music. Stop by her site and perhaps you'll like what you hear.

Who goes fishing anyway?

A while back I was presented with the option of going on a fishing trip. I thought about it and said that I didn't think so. In my mind I was thinking of numerous hours of mind numbing boringness. Really, I didn't think it would be worth my while or my money. After a bit of convincing and realizing that I really didn't have anything else to do, I decided to go. I left with Uncle Bob on a Saturday morning headed for a small town in northern Saskatchewan. The other guys headed out later that day.
Sunday morning bright and early and after a few delays we loaded up our plane and took off.
Seeing the country side from the plane was something else. I had no idea there were so many lakes up there. What a view!




After a bouncy 20 minute flight we spot the camp from the plane and head down for a landing. It didn't take us long to unpack the plane and load our rods and tackle into the boats. All though they look small and slow, these boats are a ton of fun. Mark and I of course had the fastest one. It usually took 20-30 minutes to get to a good fishing spot, but that didn't matter when your doing donuts and popping wheelies. That night the fishing was kind of slow, but the amazing meal ready for us when we got back definitely made up for it.



Our first real day on the lake was awesome. Constant fish all day. Mark and I both caught huge jacks but figured we'd catch bigger ones by the end of the trip. Bad mistake. There was a good mix of trout and jake, the trout definitely put up a better fight. It had been so long since I had last gone fishing, I totally forgot how exhilarating it was. Seriously, when you get a fish on the line it's dang exciting.

The place we stayed at was pretty rustic but had everything you needed, including a hot shower and electricity from a couple solar panels. They had two cabins for sleeping in, a big cabin where we ate and played crib. The people that ran the camp where supper nice. Besides cooking all our meals, they filleted our fish every night. One afternoon we met up with them on a beach for shore lunch, nothing like fish fresh right out of the water. This trip was seriously awesome. Even if you don't like fishing or think it's gross or something you gotta go. The scenery is amazing and there's nothing but lakes and trees for miles.
























































Conclusion, Go fishing or something.

An account of splendor

I have been looking forward to this night with a slight anticipation that something grand would come about. I had never actually gone to the Mustard Seed and could only imagine what I would experience in my foray of made up knowledge. I arrived with my friend Scott in typical awesome fashion and began moving food to a house where we would serve. In my expeditions across the yard to the house I felt particularly vulnerable. My arms were full of food and if someone were to jump me I would be delayed in grabbing my M-21 Special Forces folding knife. Your mind seems to go this way when you are around a bunch of homeless people. I continued my duties as well as embellishing the idea that I was on a covert mission, secretly intimidating the people so that they wouldn't think twice about pulling a move. Well it came time to serve. I eyed them up in their line-up and instantly knew which ones were going to be the trouble makers. As they started passing through the line my mind started shifting out of my virtual awesome reality into the reality of what was really happening around me. These people werent on some evil agenda to get me. They were there to eat,to be harm for a few moments, and to be loved. I started feeling and not just hearing their thank yous. I would adjust my "your welcome" to try and meet how they spoke to me. Sometimes it was the classic nod, sometimes it was all said in a smile, sometimes it had to be said soft and sincere, and sometime it had to be manly and assertive. I suppose this could be said to be prejudice but I dont think so. I think they saw someone who was in a small way adjusting to them, showing them that someone was noticing them and loving them individually. I enjoyed those moments so much and hope to have many more of the like.


"The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because they are generally the same people."
G. K. Chesterton

G.K. Chesterton has written some amazing books according to Ravi Zacharias. Read a few of his quotes and youll get a glimpse into the type of mind he has.

"Poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese."
G. K. Chesterton

Toast

So i've just realized my fondness of toast. It is warm and crunchy and can come in a plethora of varieties. You've got you white, your brown, your bagel, your english muffin, your light, your dark, your burnt, your not burnt, and the list goest on. Many people claim to have perfected toast but I think I can prove them wrong. You see it's not really the toast that matters so much, I believe and am under strong conviction that it is all about the technique. I am a breakfast toast person, I have never really thought about having toast in the afternoon or evening but now that I think about it I might actually try it. I like my toast like I like my tea, sweet. I prefer to cover half my toast with jam and the other half with peanut butter then before folding it together I notch the toast with my knife so that it folds easier. It's really like the way I like my girls, simple. I think my situation is quite abnormal to most other humans because you see my toast is made for me, and made well; another way i like my tea. So really what could be better, pre-made toast and pointless blogging. If you have ever wondered what i'm thinking about or looked at me and noticed that I was in deep thought, this could give you a pretty picture of what goes in my mind. Well i'm sure this will entertain me later when I read it, I hope it has made you take toast more seriously.

Thank You Kelly

Dear Ms. Clarkson,
I want to apologize for all those who judged you. You are more than just a former American Idol, and I'm sorry for not seeing it earlier. But, you must admit that you didn't make it easy for me. You really had three strikes against you--your reality TV star status, your lackluster debut album and From Justin to Kelly. Yikes. But you really won me over last year. "Since U Been Gone" was the catchiest hit of the year. In fact, the entire Breakaway album is pretty stinkin' good. Thank you for giving us a reason to listen to pop again. So Kelly, accept my apologies. You are cool. I was wrong.
(inspired by Relevant Magazine)

En-dessous

The other day was the first time that I went to Calvary Baptist in Chemainus. I had never even seen the bus before, which was of sad, but it allowed for more excitement. As we were driving up to the church, the snow on the mountains became so obviously beautiful that i knew it was going to be a good day. Church there wasn't just church. It was me with Jesus and other people with Jesus. This was sort of a new way of going about church for me. So i had an "experience" with Jesus that was rather joyful for me. Before communion i usually bring my sins before God so that i feel right and can partake in the communion. But that day I had this special revelation. I realized that I was always making myself to good toaccept grace. "I am not as bad as that guy, i would never do the things that they would do" That's the way i used to think. But i really had to humble myself and accept it on the basis that i need it as much as anybody else does. So when i brought myself to Jesus, He accepted me and i accepted Him. And there was love. Jesus loves me even when I'm full of sin, He loves me perfectly no matter what. I guess i didn't accept that before.

My next thing is more practical. Think this "You believe what you walk". If i believe that, then i pretty much believe nothing, because my walk is not in what it should believe. So this is more profound then i knew. I realized that my walk was void of Jesus and that I should be telling other people about Him. I don't mean you always have to be speaking to other people, although that I hope to do, it can be just by actions or other people seeing how you live. But it can be hard to do this if you don't know who Jesus is. So then it made sense, sort "full circle". Love. The greatest commandment is love. Everything about Him is love. So my walk should be about love, and that love should come from Jesus. Let me tell you something, this feels good. I feel like i have a purpose no matter what is happening. I can love. Like no matter where God sends me or what He has me do i can love. If i love I will fulfill all the commandments how awesome is that. But love doesn't originate from nothing. Like I said before, it comes from Jesus. I realized that Jesus is always waiting for me. I picture him at a rainy bus stop, I keep riding round and around, and round and around, till one day I realized that there is this guy waiting for me at the bus stop. Who doesn't want someone to be waiting for them, especially when
it's Jesus.

Denouma

I don't know if you've ever had that feeling that you just can't take anymore, like your brain is on overload and nothing else can fit in, but i've been having that a lot lately. And it's really been bugging me because I couldn't figure out why. In classes I was getting frustrated because I didn't feel like i was retaining anything that was being said. But fortunately I seem to have had a revelation. It suddenly occurred to me that I never, well hardly ever, concluded anything in my head. All the things that I was thinking about were pilling up without ever being resolved. And so it came time to conclude some of my thoughts. Surprisingly it was a lot easier than I thought. Things which seem so complicated and confusing were somehow solved and this was been happening a lot. I think are minds are fairly powerful and when you can get them focused on a certain goal they have strange ways of achieving it. Many of the things that i was contemplating and pondering were of no real value to my life or attitude. My mind was being overrun by my flesh and my spirit had no chance to get in. Are minds are quite strange, but I am very thankful that I know the God who created mine, and His son Jesus who frees me of my flesh everyday.

Listen To This

Sufjan Stevens has become one of my all time favorites. His music is inspiring, deep, and plathoric. I think everyone should atleast experience his style. I don't know what else i can say. His Christmas albums are available for download so here they are, and they are more than just Christams songs, believe me you'll like it. If you like this you should consider getting his other albums, "Come On And Feel The Illinoise" is fantastic.

Vol. I Hark! Songs for Christmas

Vol. II Hark! Songs for Christmas

Vol. III Ding! Dong! Songs for Christmas