Congratulations to Daniel and family for the new addition.  Head over to Daniel’s site and welcome the new little girl.  And buy his record while your at it.  Diapers aren’t cheap.

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Hey there. I haven’t been around much at all. Obviously today is Tuesday and I haven’t posted anything for “Positive Post Tuesday”, though many of you have. I don’t have a whole lot of time right now to post, but I did want to point out a guy that I have been hanging out with all week and has been a friend of mine for a couple years, Wes.

Wes is the production manager for MercyMe and basically runs around and makes sure everything works at a show.  I first met Wes on the Third Day tour.  He was helping out on that tour and we hung out quite a bit.  After the tour ended we kept in contact and eventually Wes was the one that offered me the job with MercyMe.  The last couple days Wes hasn’t had much to do because MercyMe hasn’t really done anything that requires him setting anything up, so him and I have had some time to hang out.  We went to the shows last night together and hung out the night before.  

Wes is Texas to me.  He’s a super cool laid back guy, but as intense as they come when he’s mad.  Being on two different tours with him, I have seen a bunch of different emotion and every one makes me laugh.  He’s got the thick accent, and loves all things Texas.  One thing that has always stuck out to me an even continues to is Wes’ work ethic.  There are very few people in the industry that work as hard as Wes.  He is always running around at shows making sure things are in order.  For what ever reason it is Wes and I have just clicked and it’s great to continue to be able to work together on some level.  Check out MercyMe’s Crew Blog and say hey to Wes for me.  

Sorry this “Positive Post Tuesday” took so long.  It’s been a weird week.  Even if you don’t get to it today, write something and get it on here.  It’s the thought that counts, right? So let’s see what you’ve got.  You know the drill.  Ready?  Go.

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Where did this come from today? Seriously. Tell me where you came from. (But only if you want to. That sounded a little mean.)

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Remember this?

Well today was my court date. Kristin was at work so I had to take the older boys. I stood in the front of the court room as the judge looked over my paperwork. He asked me when the last time I got a ticket was. I told him I thought it was last summer. He disagreed with me, pointed out that it had been more recent, and reminded me of the whole losing my license thing, and because of all the confusion ordered that I spend the next twelve days in jail, or pay a fine of $4,298.09. Since I didn’t have the money he told me that I need to “check in” at the jail tomorrow morning at 6:00 AM to start my twelve days.  Now it’s too late to try to come up with the money.

So I won’t be around for a while. Sucks huh? Talk amongst yourselves. See you soon.

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Spin Magazine has a pretty interesting article this month highlighting what folks in the music industry make. Anyone else see this? Obviously I am interested in it, and from the limited knowledge that I have it seems kind of accurate. What they did was take anonymous people willing to share what they make, and then asked them the pro’s and con’s about their specific job.

Some of the highlights for me were the Music Blogger making $35,000 a year, the Rappers Bodyguard making $150,000 a year, and the (twenty year) Veteran Touring Artist making $40,000 a year. This list goes on from merchandise seller to photographers to the band managers, and from what I can tell they seem pretty close. The online version doesn’t have all the positions but there are a bunch. I assume most of this is general market, mainstream music, but I don’t think the “Christian Market” is much different in most of it. Except for maybe the rappers bodyguard. I don’t know what Toby pays.

My only question is where I fall into this scale.

Read The Article

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We’ve lived in Nashville for almost three years and before we left I played guitar and sang at my home church nearly every sunday. With all the traveling that I have done and not really being able to get involved in a church, my guitar playing has been limited to mostly in my bonus room and with friends until today.

I have become friends with the worship leader at our church and this week he asked me to play. The “regular” guy moved back to California so after the service today he asked if I would be interested in a more regular spot. Originally I was a little nervous getting back up in front of people to play, but after a couple songs it felt really cool to be doing it again. And now that I am in town more often than not, I am hoping it will be a really cool fit. Although waking up at six on Sunday mornings is pretty brutal.

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Like I mentioned before, last night Kristin and I attended a banquet put on by the folks at Blood Water Mission. Neither one of us really knew what to expect, but were excited to learn more and find ways to get involved. It was amazing to hear the stories and see the lives that Blood Water Mission has impacted in the short time it has been in existence.

The night was hosted by Don Miller, an amazing author and speaker, who interviewed several people that have been involved. Jars Of Clay played a few songs, Hanson (yes, MMMBop Hanson) played a few songs, and spoke a little about their involvement, but the most powerful part of the night was an interview with two Kenyan brothers, Milton and Fred Ochieng’. See Kristin’s blog for a more info about those guys. They were amazing to see.

Throughout the whole night I kept thinking of different ways to get more involved in something so simple as digging holes for people, and obviously with my new involvement with blogging, the ideas collided, but without much original solution. I still am kicking around different ideas of where to focus, and even spoke with Dan from Jars extensively at the end of the night about it. From what Dan said, 2008 is going to be focussed on bringing the African experience to Americans here. He and I both recognized that blogging will be a huge part of that.

I am still trying to figure out all the details but I think one thing I would like to do here on this blog is raise enough money for two wells in Africa to be built. I asked Dan how much a well cost from start to finish and he told me that it was roughly five-thousand dollars. Not an insane amount, but still something that takes some planning. I don’t have a way set up yet to donate but I know that everyday there are four to five hundred readers here on this blog. I’m not mathematician, but that seems to break down to about $25 each. What I would like to see happen is that this blogs readers raise enough money for two wells each quarter (that’s three months I think). I don’t see it being that hard. I know that there are several of us are already involved in Compassion and I think that’s amazing and important ministry. What I wonder is, what’s another $10 a month?

Like I said, this isn’t something that I have talked with anyone in the organization about and I don’t even have a way to donate yet, but I wanted to ask you guys. What do you think? Is that something that we can take on? I don’t want to get half way into it and not have enough for a well. It’s silly that every single one of us couldn’t support something like this for less than ten bucks a month.

What do you think? Can we make some noise about this in the blog world?

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I’ve never been a big fan of toys that move and “live” on their own. I think they are a little creepy. Okay I think they are a lot creepy. I don’t like dolls eyes to open at me, I don’t like things to move on their own and I certainly don’t like toys to say they want to kill me.

According to this article the once the batteries were changed in this kids “Learn My Name Elmo” doll, it knew the kids name and started saying death threats rather than what it was supposed to say. Talk about freak you out huh? Check it out.

And speaking of Elmo and creepy, I don’t know which is creepier. The “Singing Dancing (possible death threat) Elmo” in this video, or the “Dancing, Twitching, Scientist” looking guy behind him. You decide.

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