Hello, my name is Anthony....

and I'm the new youth director for Foothills United Methodist Church.

YEA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's been a long time since I've posted. I'm sorry. I've had a lot on my mind with the new job, but now I've got it and I'm really truly happy. I'm incredibly moved that they chose me, as I was in a pool of very well qualified applicants. I know this because, well, they are my friends.


more to come...

When one thing settles, there is always something else stirring up.... somewhere

The loss of a friend will never be forgotten, especially Atip. He will always be remembered in pictures, smiles, and his ghost bike memorial on Park and University. It's finally getting back to some sort of normal. We must remember to smile through everything. If you're smiling, it's hard to make enemies. Thanks Atip's dad.

So it's been 19 days since my last post. I've been busy with lots of things, especially this past weekend. I had a lot of family in town this weekend, about 17 cousins, aunts and uncles staying at my parents' house and countless others. We had a family wedding on Friday, my mom's birthday party on Saturday and on Sunday we just had the fam over to hang out. They all got to head over to Vegas that night and I got to go to work on Monday morning. Lame.

Ohhh and Rachel got a new puppy that has to stay at my house. Her name is Ginger and she's a chiweenie, a chihuahua-daschaund mix. Really cute, but she's waking me up in the middle of the night now. Not fun.

Work right now is okay.... well, I really just think I'm over it. Over it in the sense that I've pretty much reached the peak of my job here and it's not very fulfilling. I feel like a robot here sometimes and that's not really how I want to live out my life, work 8-430 then go home and sleep so that I can wake up the next morning to do it again. I need substance to my work. I need to know that I'm doing something to help make the world a little bit better. Last week at my church they posted the job application for youth director. I had been talking to my friends who I volunteer in the youth group with for a little bit and they suggested that I apply for it. I thought about it a lot and decided that this was the thing for me. There have been a few occurences around me that I took as signs that I should apply for this. A few weeks back one of my faculty members/previous professor/ friend left a package for me at my desk. I opened it and it was the book Three Cups of Tea. I had seen the book around, and heard a little bit about it. It was about a climber who wanted to build schools in Asia/the middle East. Little did I know how unbelievable his story was. I teared up a few times reading the book, and it made me think, what are you doing with your life? What are you doing to make a difference in this world? I want to do something like that. I'm trying not to give too much away in the book because I think everyone should read it. I don't want to give you a cliff's notes version of it. Another sign that I came upon, was surprisingly from a health website, T-nation.com(I know, I know. Don't laugh). Here is what I read in the "Atomic Dog" section.... I'll bold the parts that stand out for me.

ATOMIC DOG
Slay the Dragon
by TC

Oh man, that Ernie leads some great life!

He's always got his suitcase with him, one of those numbers with a collapsible handle and tiny polyurethane wheels. Who knows what exotic places he's off to? Too bad he's closemouthed about his travels. Whenever you ask him where he's going he says, "Life is one big trip, buddy."

I've never met anyone whose life is so full of leisure activities. One night he's off to a Cheryl Crow concert and the next morning he's off to some concert downtown or some new art exhibition. It's the same day after day. Granted it's not shit I want to do, but his life, at least to him, is full.

People in town don't know what he did for a living (he clearly retired early, what with all that free time), but they know he travels a lot and just yesterday they saw him driving a brand new Lexus.

Most people figure he was a stockbroker; one of those Masters of the Universe who got out while the getting was good.

I know Ernie's secret, though.

Ernie is homeless. The ever-present suitcase? It contains everything he owns. The constant activities? The guy is a master of free — he knows every no-charge event in the tri-county area. And the Sheryl Crow Concert? He simply took advantage of "Dollar Day" at the county fair and she was the featured has-been performer.

The Lexus was just part of a promotion by the local car dealer: "Take a Test Drive and Lunch is on us!" Sure, for driving a new car around the block a few times, he got a 20-dollar gift certificate for a much-appreciated lunch.

Ernie "passes" because he doesn't look like a homeless guy. His clothes are always clean and pressed, but that's just part of another one of Ernie's survival tactics: he sleeps outside the public library, but every third day or so he scrounges up enough money to spend a night in a cheap hotel where he takes advantage of the free soap and water to clean up.

Tragically, pathetically, whatever synonym of sadly you want to throw in, Ernie is almost universally envied by the real stockbrokers in town. They don't know he's homeless. All they see is a seemingly happy guy who doesn't live by the clock or kiss someone's ass all day long.

"That guy sure knows how to live," is the usual sentiment, followed by "I can't wait until I'm retired, man."

A homeless guy is leading a better life than they are!

Despite their trappings of wealth — their restored Jaguars, the enormous "chronometers" on their wrists, their bleached blonde, augmented wives with puffy bovine connective-tissue injected cock-nibbling lips — they're envious of a guy with zero possessions

Somewhere the demons are laughing.

Now I'm not sure what happened to Ernie, why he dropped out of the workforce, but I don't think it was a pathological aversion to work. I think it's because work sucks. Oh, I'm not talking about my job, I'm talking about Ernie's former job and just maybe, yours.

If you're the average person, chances are your job is too small for you, too small for your spirit, too small for your soul. I don't think it used to be that way, at least to the degree it is now.

Author and historian Studs Terkel wrote a book named Working about 35 years ago. In it he detailed the working lives of regular folks, people who were rarely heard from like gravediggers, construction workers, and waitresses.

Despite the relatively mundane nature of their work, a good percentage of them took immense pride in their work. The supermarket checker had elevated her job into practically an art form, hitting the keys with one hand and pushing the food along with another while periodically whacking the conveyor button with her hip. She knew what everything costs, and when she was away from her job more than a day or two, she missed it.

Likewise, the gravedigger was proud of his neat lines and square edges, explaining that, "A human body is goin' into this grave. That's why you need skill when you're gonna' dig a grave."

The waitress bragged about how when she put a plate down, it didn't make a sound, and how there was a certain delicate way to pick up a dropped fork. She reasoned that every time she served a meal, "she was on stage."

A hospital billing-agent talked about looking in on a patient who'd lost his leg. A flight attendant talked about how she was supposed to spend at least 30 minutes of every flight socializing with passengers.

Terkel found that even for the lowliest laborer, work was a search "for daily meaning as well as daily bread."

But you don't need me to tell you that situations like this are becoming increasingly rare. Competence is rare. Enthusiasm is rare. Giving a shit is rare.

And I'm hardly the only one lamenting this change of atmosphere.

Even Presidential candidate Barack Obama wrote about this problem in his book, The Audacity of Hope:

Nothing brightens my day more than dealing with somebody, anybody, who takes pride in their work and goes the extra mile — an accountant, a plumber, a three-star general, the person on the other end of the phone who actually seems to want to solve your problem. My encounters with such competence seem more and more sporadic lately; I seem to spend more time looking for somebody in the store to help me or waiting for my deliveryman to show. Other people must notice this; it makes us all cranky, and those of us in government, no less than in business, ignore such perceptions at their own peril.

Part of what's changed is that just about everyone under 30 carries around a big emotional grande frappe contaminated with feelings of entitlement, over-inflated feelings of self-worth, and a residual sense of twisted reality caused by watching too many beer commercials showing people with no visible means of support having tons of consequence–free sex.

How can they help but feel that work isn't necessarily connected to living?

"Work" is an intangible, something you occasionally have to do to earn some scratch on your way to finding that thing that allows you to make tons of money for just being you, wonderful you.

But I don't think that's the burr that was up Ernie's butt, nor do I think it's the reason most grounded types are fed up with their jobs. I think it's the changing face of the legal system and evolving business philosophies that play a bigger part of this "quality drought."

Specifically, according to an article in The New York Times, new technologies and new management styles have put workers on "digital assembly lines" with "little room for creativity or independent thought."

A sizeable amount of the work force is now employed in call centers where they follow canned scripts and are supervised by a method called "management by stress."

Store clerks are paralyzed from making any decision on their own, no matter how fair it might seem, because the entire nation has its balls wrapped tightly in "company policy."

"We're sorry that your box of granola contained a nipple ring, parts of a human head, and a desiccated pork chop, but our manager's not here, and we're not allowed to offer refunds without his okay. Company policy, you know."

I can't believe any clerk saying such things isn't deeply ashamed; doesn't know that that's not the way things are supposed to work.

Physicians and healthcare workers in general tend to patients using a watery blend of medical science, dictums issued by managed-care administrators, and cover-your-ass-from-legal-implications protocols.

So it's probably not hard to understand why a lot of people work in hell. But it's silly to think things are magically going to change overnight. You can assume all the personal responsibility you like, but sometimes it won't make a difference.

Sometimes you just have to bolt.

Oh I know it's not always possible. Maybe you have a wife or 2.2 children and a big fat mortgage. I get it. But sometimes it's fear.

I used to be a cubicle worker; one of those guys who was depressed from Sunday night all the way through Friday afternoon. I had aspirations of writing — writing something other than computer manuals for the government — but somewhere along the way my balls had shrunk.

Looking back, I think it had something to do with my office mate. John fancied himself a science fiction writer and he had a shelf-full of rejected manuscripts. John thought he was a great writer and he couldn't understand why he wasn't sitting behind a desk at Comic-Con signing autographs for guys dressed like space aliens.

But I knew why. John's writing sucked, really, really, sucked. I could see it, but he couldn't.

In my serotonin-depleted brain, paranoia began to grow. I started to think that maybe I was like John, walking around thinking I could write when the truth was, I really, really sucked.

So I didn't do anything about it. For years.

John helped create what mythology professor Joseph Campbell called my dragon. Campbell believed the dragon is one's binding of oneself to one's ego. He would have said I was captured in my own dragon cage.

Luckily, I was able to disintegrate the dragon by anger, desperation, and sheer will.

For others, it may not be so easy. They might not even know what their dragon is, or what they would do if they could kill their dragon.

Campbell had some thoughts on that as well. He often wrote about "following your bliss," that which makes you feel the most happy — "not excited, not just thrilled, but deeply happy."

Once you find it, he advised, stay with it, no matter what people tell you.

If they tell you not to go north, go north. If they tell you to walk, run. If they tell you bow down and curtsy, stand up and stick a fist in their eye.

"You can't have creativity unless you leave behind the bounded, the fixed, all the rules."

One of my favorite movie passages, one that makes me practically tear up every time I see it, is from Good Will Hunting. The characters played by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are sucking down a couple of beers on a construction site and their discussing the future of boy-genius Will (Matt Damon).

Will is a reluctant genius, though. He can pretty much do anything but his complex dragons have him resigned to a lifetime of manual labor. His friend Chuckie, a run of the mill wanker, is still smart enough to recognize Will's talent and he's incensed that Will refuses to "leave behind the bounded":

CHUCKIE: Are they hookin' you up with a job?

WILL: Yeah, sit in a room and do long division for the next fifty years.

CHUCKIE: Yah, but it's better than this shit. At least you'd make some nice bank.

WILL: Yeah, be a fuckin' lab rat.

CHUCKIE: It's a way outta here.

WILL: What do I want a way outta here for? I want to live here the rest of my life. I want to be your next-door neighbor. I want to take our kids to little league together up to Foley Field.

CHUCKIE: Look, you're my best friend, so don't take this the wrong way, but in 20 years, if you're livin' next door to me, comin' over watchin' the fuckin' Patriots' games and still workin' construction, I'll fuckin' kill you. And that's not a threat, that's a fact. I'll fuckin' kill you.

WILL: Chuckie, what are you talkin'...

CHUCKIE: Listen, you got somethin' that none of us have.

WILL: Why is it always this? I owe it to myself? What if I don't want to?

CHUCKIE: Fuck you. You owe it to me. Tomorrow I'm gonna wake up and I'll be fifty and I'll still be doin' this. And that's all right 'cause I'm gonna make a run at it. But you, you're sittin' on a winning lottery ticket and you're too much of a pussy to cash it in. And that's bullshit 'cause I'd do anything to have what you got! And so would any of these guys. It'd be a fuckin' insult to us if you're still here in twenty years.

WILL: You don't know that.

CHUCKIE: Let me tell you what I do know. Every day I come by to pick you up, and we go out drinkin' or whatever and we have a few laughs. But you know what the best part of my day is? The ten seconds before I knock on the door 'cause I let myself think I might get there, and you'd be gone. I'd knock on the door and you wouldn't be there. You just left.

Now, I don't know much. But I know that.

If your job's not big enough for your spirit, you have a few choices, clench your teeth and bear it until you die, drop out like Ernie, or find a job big enough for your spirit.

Now. I don't know much. But I know that.

© 1998 — 2008 Testosterone, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Hopefully I'll be able to slay the Dragon soon...

Goodbye my friend

Atip Ouypron, 22 years old, was hit by a car a week ago, Thursday night around midnight on Park and University. They pulled him off life support on Saturday after his family made it into town. It's so sad that someone so young and full of life is no longer with us. He was a good guy too, a real good guy. I saw him on Tuesday night, saw pictures of him from Wednesday night on Thursday and the next morning find out it was him. Didn't know the gravity of it until later that day and the next day I went to the hospital to visit him and then they took him off life support. It's so crazy how things can change in an instant. A memorial was held for him at the intersection and his closest friends made a ghostbike. It was awesome to see San Diego's cycling community and others come together and gather to pay their respects. Please everyone, if you're riding a bicycle, wear a helmet and use lights. Ride in Peace, Atip, ride in peace. The rest of you, take care

Article in signonsandiego

Been Itching, but couldn't find the source

I've really been wanting to blog lately, it's just that I couldn't. Sorry for the delay but there are a few things I'm keeping under wraps because I don't want to jinx them. It's hard for me to be in certain situations that may or may not change my life because I always hype myself up for them and sometimes they just don't work out for one reason or another. It sounds bad, but I'm pretty much over my job right now. That doesn't mean I won't work hard any more but it does mean, however, that I will probably be looking for something new. Suggestions? I finished Three Cups of Tea about two weeks ago and I have come to the realization that I need to do something that makes a difference. I know my job helps people, but I want to have more of a part of it. I want to be part of the machine that makes the world a better place.

starting to get that crazy feeling again

So every once in a while I get bored. Not just the regular bored, because I get that all the time. When I get this "super boredom" it drives me nuts. I basically want to do something, but I feel that there isn't anything to do when in all actuality, I have hundreds of things I could be doing. It pisses me off, makes me feel a little depressed because I feel that I am a lackluster version of my former self.
I used to be full of energy, going out all the time, staying up all hours of the night, drinking the whole week and waking up in the morning awake and in enough time to make breakfast before work.
Now I'm going to sleep at 11 because I'm bored and I have to get up at 6 in order to get on my bike by 6:30 so I can go to the gym and shower to be at work by 8.
Mehh, it's funny how things are. I was sort of down when I started writing this entry, but then all of a sudden I came to the conclusion that I won't let myself be bored or not content with my life. I need to make the best of it. Maybe I was thinking about all of this because of the book I'm reading, which is Three Cups of Tea. Really good read, I'm not done with it yet, but I'd recommend it. It made me tear up more than a few times.

Enough of this really crappy rant, time to enjoy my life, even though I'm at work.

It's New Bike Day!!

Yes, that's right. I bought a new bike last night. Well, new for me. It's a vintage Italian Benotto road bike with Modolo brakes and Campy Nuovo Record Components. It's pretty nice, not gonna lie. I also bought a new Brooks B17 Special saddle, which after riding into work from two miles away, really does need to be broken in. I almost bought a slightly used (less than 150 miles) 2008 Specialized Allez Double from a guy on the forum I subscribe to, but fell in love with the Benotto when I test rode it.

Summertime

And the livin's not really easy.  It's fine though, don't worry.  I don't really get a Summer any more since I've started working.  I'm trying to pay off all my loans so I can just start spending my money on, well, money that I've already spent and interest I haven't.  Time for one of my lists that I may or may not complete. 

I have started reading more books lately.  I've been reading mostly memoirs, which include Tuesdays with Morrie (which I've read two times already), Into the Wild, and Three Cups of Tea.  I started with Into the Wild, but was at the bookstore and saw Tuesdays and picked that up and finished in three days.  I'm now reading Three Cups of Tea, which is a really great book so far.  

As you know, I have been riding bikes A LOT lately, and it is now a pretty big obsession, especially with the way gas prices have ben going.  Actually, I went to CNN.com tday to see what was going on with the world and saw this as the big headline,

As gas goes up, driving goes down. 

The Department of Transportation said figures from March show the steepest decrease in driving ever recorded.

Compared with March a year earlier, Americans drove an estimated 4.3 percent less -- that's 11 billion fewer miles, the DOT's Federal Highway Administration said Monday, calling it "the sharpest yearly drop for any month in FHWA history." Records have been kept since 1942.

According to AAA, for the first time since 2002, Americans said they were planning to drive less over the Memorial Day weekend than they did the year before.

Looks like I'm going to buy a road bike pretty soon! 

Along with cycling, I've been wanting to be healthier.  My friend has been talking about triathlons, and I've always said I wanted to do one but never have. So my best friend Cory and I are going to sign up for the Sprint Triathlon in Mission Bay in October.  

I also want to be more artistic. I haven't really painted anything in a while, and I've just put some

of my old stuff up on our living room and I am itching to do some other stuff, I just need some ideas.

Summertime slows down and I get pretty bored. Let's see what I can do with my time.