Back in April sometime Nate and Dayspring, and Brooke and I were at one of favorite places for good, cheap food (Nanas Soup House) and we got the brilliant idea that we should all go to Fort Collins Colorado over Memorial Day — so in about 3 hours we are hopping on a plane to spend a quick weekend in Fort Collins. Sweet!

This is like the best quick vacation we may ever take (hyperbole intended). We are staying at a hotle down town that has cruiser bikes (just like New Belgiums) and we can ride them to 4 Breweries — so that is our day on Saturday. At some point we are going to hit up Mecca — I mean New Belgium Brewing. I have so many questions I want to ask them, but mostly, I’m just excited to be there. They are one of the only sustainable breweries in America — wind powered and biodiesel trucks. We are also going to Odells, CooperSmiths, Budweiser, Fort Collins Brewery.

Then on Sunday we are going hiking in the Colorado Rockies. We wanted to do a coupe 14ers, but there i still too much snow. So we are doing a little lower hike that leads to a lake. I can’t wait.

I plan to take a million pictures. So stay tuned.

joel

Since my site has been up and running a few things have changed in the world of the internet. First off, Google came out with PicasaWeb. So no longer do I need to spend hours formatting pictures and making them look nice. Google does it for me. So I changed the link up top and uploaded a few more pictures. More to come at a future time.

I still haven’t had time to re-create my banner though (hence the big open white area). But I finally logged back into Google analytics again today and to my astonishment I still get 200+ hits a month in this site and I’ve updated it I think 4 times in the last 6 months. So that motivated me to write some more on here. But no guarantees how long I will stay motivated.

peace
joel

So, I had to move my website to a different host — what a hassle. So bear with me as I try to get all the pieces up and running again. You will undoubtedly see errors for quite some time. I may take this as an opportunity to change my website around quite a bit. Its been two years since it has had a makeover. any thoughts?

joel

Today was my last day working as a part-time baker at Great Harvest Sandpoint. It is the end of a part-time job that I took to help pay the bills while still in graduate school but held onto for 6 months after graduate school ended. It was fun to go back and read about taking the job. It is sad that I had to finally give up the job, as I did enjoy it. But with the upcoming move (in 16 days) to South Lake Union it was time to say goodbye. Nate and Dayspring Schlachter, the owners of the bakery and my boss were excellent to work for. The motto of Great Harvest is “Be loose and have fun. Make phenomenal Bread. Run fast to help customers. Create Strong Exciting Bakeries. And give generously to others.” and Nate and Dayspring certainly embody all these. More than once I have seen Dayspring run across the bakery to help a customer, or Nate give out free samples of coffee, bread, or muffins. Their generosity not only spills into customers but also into their employees. When we had to come in at midnight for holidays we would always have a fresh supply of vegetables and fruit, gatorade, and pizza to help make it through the night. So thank you Nate and Dayspring to being who you are to your employees and you the company you work for. And here’s to the next chapter of friendship. Washers on the roof deck, fires on the roof deck, New Belgium Beers at Nana’s, and soon-to-be road trips to Fort Collins as well as soon-to-be camping trips.

Just for fun I did a rough (conservative) calculation of what I made as a part-time baker for 15 months:

peace
joel

Is it possible for a politician to speak with honesty? To speak with conviction? To speak about his religion without offending? Is it possible?

I’m sure many of us doubt that this is possible. In a day where anybody from Jerry Falwell and James Dobson to Jim Wallis are talking about their faith we sometimes forget that it is possible. Some have forgotten that faith is not a baseball bat.

I stumbled upon this speech from Barack Obama that was given this summer. And boy am I glad I stumbled, because it is a beautiful speech that is filled with honesty, conviction, and understanding.

The speech is 40 minutes long. But i guarantee you that the 40 minutes you spend watching it will be worth it.

peace
joel

so after wrestling with a decision on what type of business to open in SLU I think I have decided on at least a direction to start running in — but this direction has to remain confidential for now. But in so doing, I have continued the hardwork of creating at least a draft of the business plan. And I have become quickly aware of my finiteness. So I post this post as a casting of the tentacles of assistance. I have some major categories of work to be researched that i have a good intuitive sense about but would love to talk to someone to confirm i’m at least pointing in the right direction. so to any of you who read this (this does not include you spammers) if you are someone or know someone that would be willing to lend an hour of their time to help with:

– Figuring out how much it will cost to build a space out
– How to get good demographics of Seattle without having to pay a fortune
– Marketing — how will I market myself and to whom
–Rental space — what is a good price and what loop holes do i need to be aware of?

thanks y’all.
joel

its official as of 10 something this morning. our first condo is for sale. we are going to miss this place — it has been quite good to us. from being able to walk up to dinner at our favorite place — Nana’s soup house. to grabbig a quick lunch t metropolitan market after running on the Burke Gilman trail. To not having to deal with parking issues at University village because we walk there. But most of all we are going to miss having people over for dinner here. Although Brooke and I rented for a year before we bought I consider this our first formative place. many a meal were had over here with good conversation, bad conversation, laughter, tears, and everything in between.

Not to transition abruptly, but I hope it sells quickly because we bought a condo in South Lake Union that we are itching to get into. Our closing date on that one is April 12th. Exciting. And it sounds like silliness, but we bought another condo as well. You know the ones we had been praying for for almost a year — well we got our first choice. But since those aren’t going to be finished until at least October 2008 we thought we would buy a different one in SLU instead of renting. craziness? some have argued. risky? maybe. but worth it to live one city block from whole foods market? 8 blocks from Lake Union. 5 blocks from the Space Needle. 7 Blocks from the downtown core. 14 blocks from Pike Place Market. ahhhh.

oh, yeah, and if any of you are looking for a great condo to buy. buy ours. the listing is here.

peace
joel

Its official. They broke ground this morning at the parking lot. It is no longer a parking lot, which means that this saturday at 5:30ish Brooke and I will hopefully be the owners of a loft style condo in downtown seattle.

do pray.

joel

hate. anger. disgust. resentment.

these words destroy us. moment by moment. inch by inch. these words constrict the life in us until all we can feel is death.

recently i was in South Lake Union and ran into a man named (for this conversation) Alan. Alan is in his 40’s and is a recovering alcoholic that lives in a community house of recovering alcoholics. This is his third time trying to make it through the entire program. The first two times, obviously he failed. So as I watched him write, scribble, sweat, and throw away draft after draft of his resume I couldn’t help but wonder what he was doing. So I approached him and said, “Hey, I’m Joel, whatcha workin’ on?” His response was simple, “My resume.” He scribbled down some more words as I watched and wondered what his life has been like, how did he get to seattle, why am i and him in the same space. Soon a conversation started and I was able to get answers to some of my questions. But the one that is relevant for this post was when I asked him why he thought he was an alcoholic. A risky question I know, but he seemed to be self-aware enough to answer it — fortunately, I was right. Without waiting for me to put the question mark on my question he said one word — RESENTMENT.

really?

I didn’t expect such an answer. but as it sat with me, and has continued to sit with me for 5 days now I feel his answer to be true.

resentment is a form of self-contempt. when i have resentment I ask myself questions like, “why did I do that?” or “what was i thinking, i’m such an idiot.” If I sit in these questions enough i soon begin to believe them to be true, and because i believe them to be true I then act on them. and it is never good to act on a lie. acting on lies gets me in trouble, and if you are anything like me, acting on lies probably gets you in trouble. none of us like trouble — so why do we continue to live this way? why do i, and us, continue to believe the lies the pinball around in our heads about ourselves. why won’t the tape stop playing?

the answer is complex, and could be anyone of a million things and so the brilliance of Jesus saves the day once again. Jesus knows that humans play tapes in their head of lies and he knows that when humans act on them trouble happens. So what does he do? he questions where we gather our identity from. he systematically destroys the very things that we think we get our identity from, and when there is nothing left to say “this is what gives me worth” he comes along side and says crazy, but true, things like “in order to find life you have to lose it” and “the last shall be first and the first shall be last” and “your identity is in me, the Christ, the Son of the living God.” (now is the time to take a deep breathe and exhale slowly.)

i continually gather my identity from things other than God. and when I do — i end up empty and screaming out for hope.

may i, and may we all, not belief the lies.

learning to love
joel

i am writing this post to say that i have been converted to the one true faith. the original. the alpha. the one that started it all.

yup, that’s right.

i now own a mac — the cool silvery one.

ahh, my coolness and trendiness just increased 10 fold. but contrary to popular belief — they still crash.

joel