Month: May 2006

  • A bird flew into our apartment tonight. That was fun. It was on our entry balcony; Christy saw it and called Nathaniel out to see it. “Ooo, look at the sweet birdie. Maybe we can pet the birdie…” and it started walking closer to our door. I started to shut the door and WHOOSH! It made it in like the Millenium Falcon made it out of the Death Star in Return of the Jedi! Like the Enterprise made it through the doors of the Dyson Sphere in Relics. (OK, you gotta be a true ST:TNG fan to know that reference…). Starbucks for the first person to tell me who guest starred in that episode w/o looking it up, and what season the episode aired.
    So, the bird flew around the living room for a while, landed on one couch, where I tried to cover it up with a blanket and scoot it into a laundry basket, but that didn’t work. It just walked out from under the blanket before I could get into position…then it flew around some more, walked behind the other couch, and got into the corner. I finally grabbed the poor little thing with a blanket and tossed it off our ledge where it flew away. Fly birdie, fly free!

    I also pulled a fast one on our Music Pastor this Sunday. We were singing this hard patriotic song in the weekend services and it was supposed to be memorized (America the Beautiful, anyone? Scott?). So what do you do when you don’t have a song memorized when you’re supposed to? You fake it, right? Do your best? I usually do…well Brian was right next to me and I noticed that HE was holding music in the performance! Now, cut the guy some slack, yeah…I mean he is 40 years old, and there isn’t as much room on the ole hard drive, you know what I mean? (Those were actually his words to me when I teased him about having the music…).
    Now, let’s just be clear-I love Brian. I love him to death! He’s great, but I just couldn’t help myself. So, before the second service on Sunday I went around and found every copy of the sheet music that was laying around. I got the ones from on stage, from backstage, from the people that were using them to do last minute rehearsing…every copy. I even told one guy who was still practicing with his copy not to give it to Brian. I was thorough. I made sure that when Brian went to grab his music right before the song, there wouldn’t be a copy in sight.  Ha ha ha…well it worked. He came out almost late (scrambling in the back to find music, I’m sure) and he did fine…
    So after the service, we’re all passing by in the back saying bye to Brian and I non-chalantley say “So…did you have a hard time finding your music?” It was awesome. He said he even sent the crew guys back looking for one and they couldn’t find one either. Bam! You just got Punk’d, Daniel style! It was great!  So fulfilling…we laughed about it for a while…good times. I love that guy…

    This weekend is the first official weekend we’ll be in that new building at church. It’s great. I get to play keyboards on Wed night for a leadership meeting. I’m stoked.

    School is also coming to a close for the summer. There aren’t really classes for my major in the summer, so I’ll have some time off. Cool. Final projects are due in the next couple of weeks, so I’m working hard on those. I also finished about six other projects in the last week or two (smaller ones) and am doing a choir/orchestra arrangement of He Reigns for Yorba Linda Friends Church for the weekend of June 16-17.  I’m super stoked about that-I haven’t heard a full orchestra arrangement of mine for a while. I have the rhythm and choir stuff done, so it’ll just be orchestrating the rest of it. I’ve been keeping busy, and we’re still praying that the Lord provides the rest of the finances we need to make it through each month. God be praised for doing it so far. It’s been incredible.

  • We went to see X-men last night. It was pretty good, but I think my favorite movie of the summer so far is still M:I:III. X-Men has all the parts we need for a good trilogy ender–big stakes, life-threatening dilemma, death of main characters–but for me it felt like it really moved along quickly. It definately assumed that you were up to speed with all the things that had happened in previous movies, (which we weren’t exactly-I hadn’t seen X2 since I saw it the first time in the theatres), so there was little character development and mostly this “the-world-is-going-to-end” mentality permiating the whole thing. Also, I thought people were dying like flies, main characters, and it didn’t seem to have been set up so that I cared. I should have cared. It was more like, “What? He’s going to die now? We’re only like 25 minutes in!!”
    It was a little shocking. I certainly felt like this was the end of the franchise…

    So overall, I give 1 1/2 thumbs up, and that’s just mostly because I love Patrick Stewart. Word to Captain Picard. He’s awesome in any role…

    Engage!


    Oh-and a super big huge gigantic thanks to Heidi for watching the kids.
    She was totally out of her comfort zone–and Nathaniel totally milked
    it…”I have to go pee-pee again…”
    Thanks, Heidi!

  • EDIT ADD: Joe just showed me this site that has videos that a friend of his makes for weddings and stuff. There is this Star Wars one that is so awesome–mostly because this guy makes them himself! It’s totally complete with light-sabers and clone fighting, and is so funny…check it out!
    I’m linking to the page where you can see a lot of his clips-just click on the one with all the light-sabers to watch it. I think there are other funny ones too…
    Oh man, so beyond me the actual how to make this stuff…I mean, this guy has final cut pro and stuff, but it’s pretty amazing for what it is. Wow.


    688fileImage

    This is the inside of the new church building at Yorba Linda Friends Church. Yeah, that’s my church. So there. It rocks.
    I was IN this building playing piano for a rehearsal. This weekend is the last weekend in the old building and the next is the first of 5 weeks that are the “grand opening” of the new building.

    Yeah, it’s just a building, and let’s be clear–the church is NEVER about a building. But it’s still cool. VERY cool.

    Just thought I’d brag a little…

    Oh, and yes, I liked Clay Aiken’s new haircut.

  • This just in from my Starbucks cup: (The Way I See It #112)

    If you’ve got a dollar and you spend twenty-nine cents on a loaf of bread, you’ve got seventy-one cents left. But if you’ve got seventeen grand and you spend twenty-nine cents on a loaf of bread, you’ve still got seventeen grand. There’s a math lesson for you.

    -Steve Martin
    Comedian & writer

    That’s hilarious.

  • EDIT ADD: 24 spoliers ahead (if you haven’t watched the finale yet)

    24 was incredible. Absolutely incredible.
    Favorite parts from the finale (in no particular order):
    –The look on Logan’s face when Jack takes off his helmet in the helicopter. Awesome.
    –The look on the 1st Lady’s face when the secret service arrest Logan. Awesome again.
    –Jack getting Christopher Henderson. I think I yelped at that one.
    –Having Joe and Heidi over to watch it with us. I invited Mike, but he didn’t want to come. Butthead.
    I’m not boycotting your blog, I’m just not commenting, or really reading all that closely. I can’t in that tiny narrow little space you call a text box. But that’s cool, Blogger must be pretty awesome. I guess you never tried going premium with xanga, you can do some pretty cool things…like…put cool backgrounds on your blog…and stuff…

    Although I’m not boycotting, I’m pretty sure the Southern Baptists are…your blog and Disneyland, again…hahaha…


    I’ll take 60 comments any day. Word to all you commenters out there…

    Friday after work I took Nathaniel to the pool for a little while before dinner. This is important for several reasons:
    1) I don’t like to take my shirt off in public, but I did.
    2) I don’t usually go swimming because of the aforementioned reason and because I have a weird phobia about touching the bottoms of pools and lakes and other bodies of water, but I did.
    3) Because I did the above two things, Nathaniel’s attitude about swimming changed. He went from not wanting to get into the pool at all and being afraid of even touching the water, to swimming laps with me while I was holding onto him–asking me to “give him another lesson!”. This was super fun, and Nathaniel wants to go back again to learn some more stuff and get some more “lessons”. It just showed me that my attitude significantly affects his outlook on life. It was pretty cool. Go Nathaniel.
    4) I got some water in my ear that will not go away. I can barely hear anything. I feel like I’m 70% deaf right now, not kidding. It’s been a little frustrating, especially since I was supposed to work on arranging all day, and I have this huge road block. All of my projects were blasting…and it won’t go away. Stupid water!! ARGH!

    In addition, we went out to go see The DaVinci Code last night, but it was sold out until the 10:45PM showing or something like that. So we decided to go to the other theatre nearby to see if we could get in to a showing at that one. But before we left the first theatre we saw this makeshift protestor guy. He was ridiculous. He was standing on a small rubbermaid stool, with a flip-chart on an easel, shouting nonsense and pointing to the nonsense on his easel. I couldn’t really make sense of what he was saying, (pause: I’m a smart guy that is working on his Master’s Degree and graduated Magna Cum Laude with a BA in Arts, and took 6 Bible courses at APU including one with Baloin–thank you very much–not to mention years of being in church and leadership. unpause) but I’m pretty sure it was that everyone was going to hell. Not just non-Christians, everyone. But like I said, it was hard to tell. We stood and watched in awe as he yelled at a bunch of Christian teenagers who were trying to argue against what he was saying, and I’m thinking to myself, boy–this guy is really missing his target audience. Many other thoughts also went through my head, but the strongest feeling I had was of sorrow. I felt sorry for this guy, who was sorely mistaken in believing what he was doing was making a difference to anyone.
    I just think the dumbest thing anyone can do is stand on a soapbox and yell at people to try and convince them of anything. I watched the people around me, and most of them passed by thinking the same thing I was–this guy is a kook. It was sad, just plain sad.

    Well, the other theatre was sold out too, so instead of DVC we went to see Over the Hedge. It was so well made, and hilarious. What a great combination of characters and voices. Steve Carell, William Shatner, Bruce Willis, Avril Lavigne (what!?) and Eugene Levy (plus some more, of course). I loved it, and I’m glad I got to see it before I took Nathaniel, ’cause he would’ve been talking to me the whole time, and I would have been like, “be quiet! this is funny!” So now I’ll take him and have already seen it…Steve Carell was great as the squirrel…oh great movie!! Definitely worth it.

    24 season finale on Monday night (party at my place if you want to come).

    Nertz on Sunday night, you’re also invited. Just let me know.

  • SB poster copy

    3rd EDIT: Yes my friends, Starbucks again. Free sample again–this time a venti, yes, a venti. I rock. I rock.  Banana fraps are awesome–especially when they’re free.

    C’mon, you know you wanna comment…


    2nd EDIT: New record–5 times in one day. This time I got a free tall Bananas and Caramel Frappuccino. All I have to say is 1) I’m the awesomist, and 2) Fa la fa la, I love Free Sample Day (or shall we call it New Product Day?). Amazing. And definately a world record. 5 trips, 3 stores, free samples everywhere…

    classic.


    EDIT: I just set a world record and went to SB for the fourth time today AND I didn’t buy any drinks AND I sampled the rest of the stuff that I hadn’t sampled yet. I’m unbelievable.
    This has been another episode of Daniel Being Awesome.
    Tune in next time…


    bevCatImg_blended-frap

    New Frappuccinos are here! Now, if you’ve been in a Starbucks today (no, I haven’t been 3 times…oh wait, yes I have…) then you’ve noticed that the decor is new for summer and there are new summer drinks and pastries!

    Now I was a little leary at first, but I sampled, and I sampled, and I sampled some more, and it is pretty tasty stuff. Banana & Caramel Frap, Banana Mocha Frap, and Banana Cocanut Frap (all offered with creme based or coffee based) and with pretty much any mixture of those flavors–like perhaps a Banana Mocha Cocunut, or Bananas and Creme.

    Yes, I know, in theory it sounds disgusting. I dispise bananas in my Jamba Juices, (they taste especially bad with femme boosts), and overall I don’t really eat bananas or banana flavored things. I was hesitant, if not dissapointed. But then I tasted and saw, and it was good.

    Ok, so I went to my favorite Starbucks on my lunch break, because they saved me some menus for my office, and I wanted to get that decorating done and out of the way today. While I was there I had a small sample size of the banana caramel frap, and it was yummy. Then, as I was driving back to work I thought to myself “Self, we should stop by other Starbucks store to see if they are sampling the other flavors of fraps” and so I did.
    I stopped by the Starbucks right by work and saw someone outside with a sample cup and was like “YES!”. I walked in and asked this dude if they were sampling, and he was like “Totally!–oh wait, we’re out!”  I was sorely dissapointed but then he said “But don’t be trippin’ man! I’ll make you some right now!”. He then proceeded to drop a big chunk of the new banana cake in my hands–which was delightful. Then he made me an entire grande Banana Mocha Frap as my free sample! Sweet! And I LOVED it.

    Starbucks is so good to me. Thank you, Starbucks. I love you.

    (so dramatic…)

    So don’t be afraid to try these tasty drinks. AND, if you go during the first week of new drinks, don’t be afraid to ask for free samples!

  • I don’t know where to start with this thing because so much has been going on lately. I’m overwhelmed with the amount of information that is potentially blogworthy…so instead of balking, I’ll just start spewing…

    -Mike says not to go see Poseiden. Done.

    -Had a good Mother’s Day ending up at Disneyland with new friends from church, and had a great time. I had ice cream from my favorite place “Catch a Flave” in California Adventure. This stuff is just vanilla soft serve with a small ring of flavor around the edge. It’s unique and tasty. Mmm…Butter Toffee. I highly recommend.

    -I’m listening to the new M:I:III soundtrack by Michael Giacchino. It’s cool. I really like the sutble changes to the theme in the opening. This guy was a really smart choice for this film. Same dude that scored The Incredibles and currently scores LOST. He’s also on board for scoring Star Trek XI…nice. I love it already.

    -New iTunes commercials are great. A nice choice, Steve Jobs. Watch out, though, pretty soon those commercials will be…OBSOLETE! (waving hands around in the air)

    -I played keyboards at church this weekend, and it was awesome. The musicians are all pros. I’m pretty sure everyone there besides myself is performing/gigging full time. The drummer played The Lion King at the Pantages Theatre for 2 1/2 years while it was here. He played around 900 of the roughly 1100 shows while it was showing in town. Wow. It was an incredible honor to play with all of the musicians, and totally fun. I was also asked to play piano at a leadership meeting in the new building. This is going to be the first night anyone plays in the new building (you must understand that the people have been waiting for this thing to open for 7 years–I think they actually signed the contract with the architect in 1994 or something–so it’s a REALLY big deal). I was talking to Brian, (the worship pastor) and he was like “It’s just a building–but then you start thinking about a hundred year-old church, and a 30 million dollar building, and you think to yourself  ‘There is only going to be ONE grand opening of this thing’ so you really want to get it right…”. I do not envy you my friend. I loved it though, and I’m totally stoked for the next time I play. So exciting!

    -Pray for us and Noah. God provided all the $ to pay for the Independent Assessment we got for him a while back, and now we may have to shell out some major cash to get started with Lovaas if they don’t approve our increase in hours. Then we’ll have to hire a lawyer…so it’s is a little daunting right now. Thanks for thinking and praying for us. We’ve been amazed at God so far in this whole new adventure in life, and I doubt He’ll abandon us now. It’s just crazy.

    -SNL was a little dissapointing on Saturday. Julia did great, but overall it was still below par. The sketches were almost funny again…I feel like they’re just missing that spark you need for the comedy to happen. It’s just been falling too flat lately. Oh well, a couple of funny things (myspace skit–monologue–Al Gore). Hope things shape up soon…

    -Calendar is so full. Trying to keep it all straight!

    -Contemplating the whole blogger thing…I feel like Mike moved to China, even though it’s just domain names…it’s weird. Farwell, Mike. Hope you have a good life…unless you ever want to leave the dark side and return to the ways of the Force…

  • The prank is complete…

    see what one of the corroborators wrote here.

    Femme Boost 001

    Femme Boost 002

  • I’ve lost all motivation to blog. Mike was my inspiration.
    He showed me the ways of the xanga, but now he’s turned to the darkside. Mike!
    You are my Anakin!

     
    YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE THE CHOSEN ONE!

  • EDIT:
    I can’t get the WICKED soundtrack out of my head. It’s there all day and night-and I love it. Help!


    47b6db29b3127cce98549c0ec17d00000027108GcMmrNw0k
    Me on the phone talking to Christy behind the stage at Graduation…I think I was like “OK…I gotta go!”
    I knew someone was watching!

    Here’s me again, from the back…I’m so official with my earpiece in…
    daniel2