Word to the Wise

Things I've learned tonight:

Never play Truth or Dare with Brits who've been drinking.

It rots to be a Messiah fan now.

Scones and jam are amazing at 2 in the morning.

Luke 15:4-7.

--Brandon

"My conscience a reminder of forgiveness that I need."

My day off.

Well, no classes today, and since I was already sick, I slept in until 2:30...in the afternoon. But the good news is that I feel much much better.

Someone set of the fire alarm this morning and I'm pretty sure they woke everyone up. It's always disconcerting to wake up to a high-pitched wail and red flashing lights.

Yesterday, I hung out with British Sarah from about 6 in the evening until 2 in the morning. It was pretty awesome. We listened to just about everyone of each other's favorite bands and she got me hooked on a CD by a band called Guillemots. Check 'em out because they're good.

I did feel a bit bad while she was over though, mostly because I was watching the numbers and scores for American football. Philly loses again, good news there. How on earth can Denver blow a lead like that? Steeler's season looks hopeless. And I'm pretty sure Carolina is still choking.

But at least Messiah won their game.

Oh, and pictures are on their way.

--Brandon

"In dreams, it seems you can't fight, but some weapons would be nice."

Harry Potter and the Blog Update That Covered Two Days of Fun.

Well I finally came down with whatever "Fresher's Flu" bug has been going through all of the first years here at the University. So I'm pretty much stuck in my room reading Steven Erikson books, and listening to a mix of Five Iron Frenzy, Pink Floyd, and the Braveheart soundtrack. Also I decided to update the blog.

After a strong start to my four-day weekend on Thursday (which came in the form of a Pina Colada with some of my favorite "Americans-in-England"), Friday went pretty well. No classes meant I could sleep until noon. Then came lunch with Siobhan, Deidra, and Siah at the FCH refectory; also we picked up our 70 pound stipend, and thank goodness for that, because I needed some groceries. Friday ended with Dan, Doug, Will, Josiah, and I having our first "Pub Night" after weeks of talking about it. What a night it was, too: I think the topics of discussion covered the intersection of faith and rationality, church denominations, our personal stories of growing up in the church, favorite bands, and 5 albums people must listen to before they die.

All that over a pint of Lowenbrau (is it bad that I think it tastes good?).

Saturday also turned out well. Doug and I hit up the two halloween costume shops on High Street to find some good halloween garb. And find it we did. I purchased my Gryffindor scarf, circular glasses, and phoenix-feather wand (guess who i was?) and Doug found a cardboard box and some wrapping paper and bows. If you're going to a Halloween party as "God's gift to Women", you have to do it right.

Afterwards, it was grocery-shopping to support my diet of yogurt, frozen pizza, deli-style ham sandwiches, Frosted Flakes, and canned fruit. Then off to Park Bar for the party...

...which was actually no different than any other Park Bar party, except that the running theme was make yourself look as dead as possible. I ended up heading out at about midnightand made it home to my flat for the Marshmallow Bowl.

In case no one knows what the Marshmallow Bowl is, it is the game of the Messiah Soccer season when Etown and Messiah play each other in a grueling rivalry match.....and Messiah rocks their face. It was no different last night, Messiah winning 1-0 and remaining undefeated for two seasons in a row.

Things I learned this weekend:

1) Some guys think Harry Potter costumes are "gay", but are perfectly fine with wearing women's clothing.

2) If you want girls to notice you at University, just wear a Harry Potter costume to the Halloween Party.

3) Ron Weasely does not get nearly the amount of props that he should.

4) Messiah is still better than anyone else's team.


Also, my 5 albums were OK Computer (Radiohead), Before These Crowded Streets (Dave Matthews Band), Kind of Blue (Miles Davis), Deloused In The Comatorium (The Mars Volta), and Pretend You're Alive (Lovedrug). Runner-up goes to any FIF album ever made.

And I'm glad the Skins have a bye-week, because a man can only cry so much before it just hurts.

--Brandon

"Just 'cause you feel it, doesn't mean it's there."

Late Nite with Brandon

It's about 1 in the morning over here in good ole England.

Some girls on the ground floor of my dormitory just got in verbal fight with the security guard. Yeah, that's a situation I really want to be around. Thankfully they weren't dumb enough to press the issue too far.

Josiah and Deidra and I leave tomorrow for Gloucestershire. Just for the day, but it should be sweet. The town has a good reputation for all forms of hanging out. I'll make sure to take some good pictures.

Isn't it funny how sometimes we can reduce our faith to how many things we're doing right or wrong, to worrying about how the people around us will perceive? It's like our fear of being labeled a hypocrite makes us overexamine our actions and we become so paranoid that anything we do is wrong that it makes us forget one of truly amazing facets of our Christian faith: God's love.

God's love is not based on whether we do everything right or not. It is there, unconditional and unchanging. It is what assures us of His forgiveness when we make a mistake and when we don't get it right. Romans 8:38-39 describes it: "For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Actually that whole chapter is pretty good reading. So read it.

--Brandon

"Sleep with your head against the sky tonight."

Further Instructions (Lost Spoilers!)

So I know that the writers were obligated to tell what happened to Locke, Eko, and Desmond in the episode...

But I wish that it hadn't seemed like a setup episode. I mean it was good...in that it told what happened to them. But nothing really gets said about what happened after Desmond turned the failsafe key. The three just end up in the jungle and neither seems to say anything about it (apart from Desmond's line to Hurley). And Most of the episode is about Locke having to clean up his mess, which means rescuing Eko from...a polar bear?

When did the polar bear come in? Did it just decide to cavort around the jungle and stumble upon Eko? I guess we're supposed to infer that. Also Locke's conversation with "Island Boone" was cool, but the episode started moving so fast after that that I couldn't digest all that I had seen. It's like the writers knew it was filler, so they tried to make it artsy...or something.

The one part I really didn't like: the intro of new characters on the beach. Could that have seemed more obligatory and forced, even though it played logically? I also know who I want to leave now: Nikki. I haven't disliked a character that much since Season 1 Sawyer and Ana Lucia. Give Hurley a break and stop whining...in your only line of the episode.

Ah well, next week looks pretty good.

"If mercy fall upon the broken and the poor, Dear Father, I will see you there on distant shores."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_Commissions_Act_of_2006


Now, I know this may depend on how trustworthy Wikipedia really is, and I don't want to take a page out of Keith Olbermann's book, but...I must say, I'm a little concerned about the implications of this. I'm not even that politically minded compared to most, but this just makes me worry about how much power our government will end up giving itself.

Feel free to educate me more on the subject. I would greatly appreciate it.


--Brandon

"He's right on top of us....I wonder if he is using the same wind we are using."

Sons of Scotland!

So Scotland...pretty much one of the coolest places ever.

Deidra, Josiah, and I flew in on last Thursday's afternoon, and got to our hostel as fast as we could, mostly because we were starving. What a fun night. Good food, good laughs, beautiful city, and a slice of some pretty phenomenal chocolate truffle cake.

Friday, we woke up and headed straight to Edinburgh Castle. It's a real shame America has no castles; they're pretty much amazing. Within the castle walls were tona of small gardens, memorials to Scottish soldiers, cannons on display, beautiful views of the city, and...the honopurs of Scotland (yeah, that's right, golden scepter, golden crown, other important items of the golden persuasion).

After that came a quick walk down the Royal Mile/Edinburgh High Street, and a stop at a small restaurant that served some delicious French Onion Soup and toasted bread. And then came Arthur's seat.

Picture a large undeveloped hill with a pathway up the side of it. Now picture that next this hill is a larger, more mountain-like one with a summit that gives an unobstructed view of the surrounding city of Edinburgh. Now picture all of that....at sunset. Yeah, it was pretty sweet.

The next day brought us a trip to see some of the architecture in the city, most of which we didn't know the names of. But it looked pretty cool. And of course we stopped at the obligatory tourist trap shop for all our Scottish needs.

That night Josiah and a had some drinks at a Scottish pub. Now that was pretty fun. We just sat around and talked. A good night, I must say.

Then we took a bus to Glasgow and proceeded to stay up the whole night to catch a flight into London, which we almost didn't make on account of showing up at the wrong airport inthe middle of the night. That was an...interesting experience.

But all in all a great, great trip. Again, I am overcome with how I am blessed.

--Brandon

"Ambition makes you look pretty ugly."

Nothing's gonna change my world.

So here are those Abbey Road pictures I promised:

Investing in people.

So I came across this devotional from Our Daily Bread this afternoon. I thought you all might like it, especially you History Church folks.

http://www.rbc.org/odb/odb.shtml

Also, I'll get my Abbey road pictures up soon.


--Brandon

"It's been said, a long time ago. You'll be the first and last to know."

Some pictures.

So here some London pics:

London Calling

This was possibly one of the best weekends ever.

I managed to see pretty much all of London that there really is to see. At least in a tourist sense. We all stayed in kind of hole-in-the-wall hostel, but the eight of us got along so well, that it was wicked fun.

On Saturday, we met Amanda's friend Eric at the Tower of London to grab lunch. Everyone except Doug, Dan, and I also grabbed some tickets to tour the Tower of London and see the Crown Jewels. Having no desire to really do that, the other three of us set off on our own adventure.

This adventure consisted of walking across London Bridge while pretending it was falling (bet no one's ever done that), seeing the Globe Theatre replica, sitting on the steps of St. Paul's Cathedral, trying to find the right Tube line to take us to King's Cross, getting our pictured taken at Platform 9 and 3/4 (we dorked out a little), zooming down to Westminster, getting eyefuls of Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, finding out that Abbey Road was not where I thought it was, and sitting on lion statues in Tralfalgar Square.

A good day.

The next day (Sunday), Doug, Amanda, Eric, and I made the pilgrimage to Abbey Road. I cannot express in words what that felt like. The entire front wall was covered in graffiti so I decidd to add my own. I wrote "Shine On You Crazy Diamond 8/10/06" because everyone had written some Beatles lyrics (my favorite was "Lucy in the Sky with Bacon"). Also someone had written a message to U2 when they were recording there, and I almost scribbled it out. An utter disgrace.

Afterwards, the four of us took man many pictures walking across the crosswalk. And yes, I am barefoot in one picture, which if you know anything about Beatles albums, you'll understand. The day was finished with some chill time in Kensington Gardens.

Oh yeah, I saw Buckingham too. I'll post pics tomorrow, I promise.

And guess what movie the bar at our hostel was playing on Saturday night: Roger Waters' performance of The Wall in Berlin. Amazing.

God is so good to bless me with these friends and sights.

--Brandon

The Ideal State...

So I'm radically excited about my Ethics class. Most likely because there's a good mix of opinion in it, and next week's class is about Christian ethics. Should be a good one.

The one thing that frustrates me, though, is that I don't really say the things I want to in those classes. I'll have thoughts and things to say, but I'll hesitate, maybe thinking, "I'm one of the only Americans here and that's scary" or some such rubbish like that.

But that's why I want to be here. I want to be one of the only Americans. So i think i just have to deal and speak up more. I need to harness that boldness that I know I have but for some reason hides everytime I really need it.

In other news, Siah, Deidra, and I are mostly booked for Scotland. I can't wait.

And the new Killer's record is kind of a big deal.


"And it's true we name our children after towns that we've never been to."

Wondering.

So I get on the bus home from classes today, and Siah picks up a newspaper. The front page is this:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/5400570.stm


I can't tell in words how sad it made me. I'm sad that anyone would ever do this to another person, especially young girls. I'm sad that this is how people choose to solve their problems. I'm sad that vengeance is still something we cling to as humans, and we think that somehow, if we get back at people, it will mean something. I'm sad that, for all appearances, this man is spending eternity apart from God.

This is why we need the love of Christ. I don't buy the notion that, if we learn how to be good or if we rationalize away this behavior in an attempt to prevent it, then it will stop. Only the power and love of God shown through Jesus Christ can change the tainted hearts of men, only His power and love can cause us to give up our selfish vendettas, and only His power and love can truly show us how to love our neighbors. Nothing else can.

I have many thoughts in my head, but I don't know which to say first.

Romans 8:38-39