TheGeoffRe(y)port

Well, the last time I wrote here was before the month of June started, so for the first time since this blog started, I have an entire calendar month with no posts. That’s probably something of an indication of where things have been at for a while with life. Since I last wrote:

• I’ve changed jobs
• Finished up with youth ministry at YVV
• Spoken about youth ministry on a Sunday morning at YVV
• Had my grandmother go into hospital (twice - but she’s doing OK now by all reports)
• Had my sister get married
• Found out we’re getting kicked out of our beautiful little house because the landlord is selling up
• Planned for our trip to the Solomon Islands (we leave later today)

It’s not that I haven’t been wanting to write, but the creativity and the motivation just hasn’t necessarily come to the party. Plus I’ve spent the last week or so fighting off a mongrel of a cold. Of course, for most of you there’s very little of this that will come as a surprise, because you’ll have been following along over at the hub of all earthly wisdom.

Anyway, I’m planning on getting a few thoughts into binary today, but if I don’t, you certainly won’t hear from me until I’ve come back from the Solomons - circa July 12.

Wifey tagged me on this movie meme. So I figured I’d better do it.

Name one movie that:

1. Made you laugh
Empire Records

2. Made you cry
Life Is Beautiful

3. You loved when you were a kid
The Lion King

4. You’ve seen more than once
Snatch

5. You loved but were embarrassed to admit it
Love Actually

6. You hated
How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days

7. Scared you
Independence Day (OK - I was pretty young)

8. Bored you
Hoodwinked

9. Made you happy
Batman Begins

10. Made you miserable
Last King Of Scotland

11. You weren’t brave enough to see
The Ring

12. One character you’ve fallen in love with
Amelie

13. The last movie you saw
Iron man

14. The next movie you hope to see
The Dark Knight

Thought I’d better wait until they’d announced this themselves, but huge congratulations to Scott and Christina who have just welcomed  Johanna Keren Aitken into the world. A little sister for Jemima, and just an exciting thing to tell people about. Sounds like all involved are doing well.

Photo at Scotty’s announcement post.

Jess posted this over on all said, and you’ve heard the story before, but I thought I’d put this up here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NyGdiAC6js

(If you’re reading this in a Feed Reader, it looks like it won’t come through - so make sure you visit the actual page to see the video) 

I’ve written before about my obsessions (and I’m thinking in particular about the whole “stacking thing”), but partly due to the whole being married thing, I’ve become aware of some funny little things I do. So here they are:

1. Once I get home from work, I’m unlikely to have a proper conversation for about half an hour, or an hour if it’s been a long day. Then, I suddenly get a rush of talking-ness and everything is OK.
2. I have a nasty habit of bidding on things cheaply, thinking: “it’s OK - I’ll never win it at that price”. That’s how come I’ve got Original Munchkin which arrived on Friday.
3. I frequently talk back to the news. Worse to “current affairs” shows. Even Especially when there’s no one else around.
4. I think better when I have something in my mouth, which leads to either bouts of obesity, or an inability to lend my pen to anyone other than my wife. I’m flipping between the two.
5. There’s an air freshener in our public toilet at work that goes off periodically and sounds like someone sniffing. Every single time it goes off, it makes me freak out that there’s someone standing over my right shoulder.
6. My Google Reader is currently subscribed to 186 feeds. I know that’s too many, but there aren’t any that I’m willing to give up. Not all of them are blogs: I check the news headlines from the BBC World News, and The Age, and I also get things like IT security notifications just to keep an eye out. But it’s way too many.
7. Despite my football team only having made the finals twice while I’ve been alive, having also won the wooden spoon last year, and our prospects for this looking faint at best, I still bought a membership for my wife and I for the upcoming season.

So there you are. Does anyone share any of my freaky-ness?

I’m sure that the vast majority of you have already been caught up over at my wife’s blog (posts here, here, and here). If you haven’t, then I suggest you do that first

The wedding happened, and it worked - we’re husband and wife. The whole thing went wonderfully, although it was freaking hot! We’ve enjoyed a fantastic time away, hanging out, honeymooning, seeing Adelaide and surrounds, and then finally on the way home (about 4 hours from the house), we managed to blow up my poor little corolla. The execution hasn’t been carried out, but it now seems certain that the ‘rolla won’t be making any more big trips. Or small trips.

To keep the unruly mob happy, I’m posting our vows below. We’d written our own vows, and between you and me, were pretty happy with them:

Rebecca today I am committing myself to being your husband, and all the adventures and challenges of life together. I promise to follow the example of Jesus and make choices that put your needs before my own. I will stand by you and stand for you. Your heart will be safe with me, and I entrust you with mine. I want to love you the way that God loves you; without reservation. I promise to honour you, learn from you, listen to you and laugh with you. I choose to serve you, respect you, and love you before all others for the rest of my life. This is my covenant with you

If you’re reading this and you helped out at all on the day (and there are plenty of you who helped), you have my immense gratitude. And to Kat who drove us from Horsham to Ballarat (and then back again) and mum and dad who picked us up from Ballarat - I owe you big time. It’s been fun, but reality had to hit soon enough.

This afternoon, I will marry my best friend.

That’s all. See you in late January.

My wedding is in 33 sleeps. That’s coming up, really, really quickly. And it’s important, it’s big, and it will be very exciting. But it’s not the key part. The important thing is that in 33 sleeps, I’m going to be married. And that’s a whole different kettle of fish. Because while the people who are making small talk (and there’s nothing wrong with that at all) are asking “How’s the wedding preparations going?”, the people who I’m in really close relationship and who are wanting to find out what’s really going on are much more likely to ask something along the lines of “How are you going with preparing to be married?”

It’s a curious phenomenon that a culture who isn’t really sure what it wants to do with marriage, really wants to do something big and impressive for a wedding. And while I’m in awe of my bride-to-be’s ability to resist the pretentious and expensive in favour of the personal and home-grown, there is constant pressure to go bigger, more spectacular, more more more more more. We want to celebrate our wedding, we want it to be a very special day, but we don’t want to incur the sort of costs that are going to send us and our immediate families into debt. And ultimately - it’s a party. A big party, a nice party, a party with a beautiful sacrament in a church beforehand,  but it’s a party.

But preparing for a marriage. Wow. Marriage will surely be one of my life’s biggest challenges, and it’s a big call to be going into this thing. There’s so many ways I can stuff it up - and probably some of them that I will. There is no doubt in my mind that Rebecca and I should be taking this step together, but I’m nevertheless terrified by the scale of this commitment we’re entering into. It’s exciting, and it’s a happy feeling, but it’s undoubtedly mixed with fear and terror.

So how’s the wedding preparation going? Good. How’s the marriage preparation? That’s a bigger and better question.

The day that Steve Bracks (former Victorian Premier) resigned, he said that part of what he was proud of was that during his time in Government, they had changed the conversation to one around education, healthcare, blah blah. Now regardless of whether or not you agree that he did that, the point is a valid one. If you control the conversation, you control what is perceived to be valuable.

I think part of the reason that it appears the federal government is likely to lose the upcoming election is that they are no longer able to dictate the conversation with regard to media. Howard has used lots of the same lines as he used against Latham and Beazley, whereas Rudd at least seems to be offering something that sounds different enough that he has been able to change the way that the conversation is dictated.

Today is Blog Action Day. It’s a day when thousands of blogs all over the world, in all kinds of genres and niches are posting about the environment. In fact, you are reading one of those very posts. Because the conversation has changed. Where before the conversation around environmental concerns were mostly from the edges, or at least how much giving a token consideration to the environment would cost economically - it is now the mainstream that is talking about ways to take seriously the challenge to leave this earth in the same condition we start with.

As Christians, it’s time we stopped hiding behind ignorance or apathy and start trumpeting the cause of the environment. Because doing something about God’s creation is a kingdom purpose. And when the wider conversation aligns with the principles of the kingdom we have a responsibility to amplify that voice. We need to get behind people like Tri Robinson who are advocating the cause of the environment.

But even more - we need to get out there and do something. Whether it’s making lifestyle choices that can cut down on your transportation, limiting your use of extra plastic bags, choosing slightly more expensive but carbon-neutral energy options. Despite what Kermit might say - it’s relatively easy being green.

This one will lose any of the non-Australian readers, but I’ve got something I want to float with people. “Summer Heights High” (you can even download episodes from the website) is very funny, and very, very wrong. But does anyone else watch that show (and particularly the Jonah storyline), and feel a really strong pull towards doing something to help kids like that. And as someone who’s currently re-evaluating career orientation, what does that say?