The mullet is out in full force at the N Kansas Expressway Walmart here in Springfield today. I don’t know what exactly it is that brings a large concentration of them here, but I have counted 14 mulleted individuals within the last hour or so. I say individuals because it is, sadly enough, not limited to the male gender.

Would it really hurt to get a haircut with an extra low fade?

I am sitting here at Burger King on my lunch break here in Bolivar, Missouri. Each Saturday I make the 30-mile trek from north Springfield up here to assist with AT&T sales at Wal-Mart.

Bolivar holds a stark contrast to Springfield. In fact, Highway 13 on the way out of Springfield is a very scenic drive — I love passing farms, old houses, and taking the curves and ascending the hills. It is a nice little half hour of reflection.

Bolivar itself has a population of about 10,000 people. Nice-sized town with a town square, a college, and a bevy of places to eat. Electronic readerboards for the various retailers around town display the town’s pride in the high school’s girls basketball team, who will soon play for the state championship. It has a small town feel and it is rapidly growing.

As for me, I like the trip up here. Granted this is only my second time in Bolivar proper but it is really nice to be able to leave the monotony of my life in Springfield and see a different town for a bit. Everyone I have run into here is friendly, keeping par with the Ozarks hospitality I have been blessed with in my time here so far.

I still have a half hour of lunch left so i am going to run to the town square and shoot some photos. Look for them in the photo section tonight.

EDIT 3/8 2:17 AM - Dan Browning uploaded some excellent photos he shot to the New Horizons Church web page. Here they are.

Camp Wa-Ri-Ki 2008, the spring weekend retreat of New Horizons Church in Washougal, WA, is underway in the hills of Skamania County. Yesterday evening I spoke with Cris Birch, a good friend of mine, and Rainier Camina, my former youth pastor and the retreat’s director, and they shared that roughly 30 campers had registered to attend the camp, and requested continued prayers for this weekend.

I am posting this as a courtesy to Rainier and the staff, and once again asking that everyone please be in prayer for the retreat this weekend until it ends at noon on Sunday.

Dan Browning emailed me yesterday and said he will provide photos and video of the retreat once it is over.

Sad news from my hometown today. Apparently this happened days ago but I wasn’t notified of it until today.

From the Longview, Washington Daily News:

A Rainier-area man has been missing for a week and his family is asking for the public’s help to find him.

Gabriel Triplett, 23, is 5-foot-7 to 5-foot-8 and about 160 pounds, said his mother, Alice Triplett, who lives in the Goble area near Rainier. He has blue eyes, his hair is dark brown and he may have facial hair because his beard grows quickly, she said.

…

The Columbia County Sheriff’s Office has searched in all the places he has gone in the past, such as Goble Falls, she said.

Anyone with information as to the whereabouts of Gabe Triplett can call the Columbia County Sheriff’s Office at (503) 366-4611.

KATU also has a video report on the disappearance.

I remember Gabe and Lola from my days at Rainier High School (’98-’02). Gabe was a monster on our football team and he was a great guy to hang around. We weren’t friends per se, but we hung around enough to share a few laughs and good conversations.

Both Gabe and his sister were involved in a terrible car accident in 2003 that killed her and left him with brain damage. Suffice it to say the guy has overcome a lot, and I am saddened by the news that he has disappeared without a trace over the last few days.

My prayer is that he is found soon, alive and well. I hope you all join in that prayer also.

UPDATE 3/7 - Still no sign of Gabe but there is a report that a witness saw him in Longview (across the Columbia River) yesterday. Grant Bergerson and Cody Marston, two of my high school friends, were shown on a KGW story on the search for Gabe today.

As of today, I am officially hunting for an apartment and hope to move out of the ‘rents place by the end of March.

Springfieldians, do any of you know any good apartments around here? I have a couple choices but I seek some input on past experiences with apartments so if any of you are (or have been) apartment renters, your input is appreciated.

Thanks!

I know I don’t live in the Northwest anymore, but I just wanted to post this as a courtesy to the folks over at New Horizons Church, my former church in Washougal, WA. Their spring church retreat at Camp Wa-Ri-Ki is coming up tomorrow and will run through Sunday. No word on how many people are expected at the retreat but I plan to get the director, Rainier Camina, on the phone tonight to chat and pray about the camp a bit.

The theme for this year’s retreat is “My Stand” and more info can be found at the New Horizons Church page.

Yeah, there has been a controversial moment or two at Wa-Ri-Ki in the past, but every year I’ve been there my friends and fellow staff have been mightily blessed, and that’s what we need to concentrate on. I urge my readers to please add Camp Wa-Ri-Ki this weekend to your prayer lists, that the Lord would bless everyone there and they would see people turn their lives to Christ.

I also remember last year, Dan Browning (a faithful reader of my blog, and techie extraordinaire) shot some excellent video and photos of the event. I edited some of the video (rather crudely in some instances) but I have some videos of it on Brightcove if you’re interested. My favorite video (a friend of mine shot this) is what turned out to be one of my favorite Wa-Ri-Ki memories ever: Gene Rutherford leading the young adult ministry class in “If God Be For Us.”

Loooooooooong time passing.

I grew up in an era in which Nickelodeon was still headquartered in Florida, ABC’s Saturday Morning was worth watching, and KPTV in Portland (my former employer) along with others across the nation showed The Disney Afternoon around 3 PM each day. PBS countered with an awesome programming block for an hour, running Square One TV and Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego in succession at 5 PM.

Square One and Carmen Sandiego. Two of my all-time favorite shows.

So today I went Youtubing (couldn’t go innertubing because the snow is all melting), and I found a treasure trove of clips from Square One episodes of years past.

For those of you who don’t know what Square One TV is, it helped those of us like myself that really suck at math. It was a variety show, more or less, that incorporated skits, game shows and crazy parody music videos that all focused on mathematics.

Here’s an example video. This music video is called “Count on It.”

A lot of thought and effort went into that video. Anyway, it was all good fun for us kids that wanted a cool way to learn math. Who could forget Dirk Niblick? USE YOUR NOODLE!

And then there was Mathnet. Pat Tuesday had my heart. What a hottie. I’m not into blondes (I insist I truly am not, red hair is where it’s at, yo), but my Lord she was awesome. Such a pretty face solving equations. Where else could you lust after someone trying to figure out what x was in 73 + x = 8934453 and get away with it? Shhhhyeah, that’s right.

As you can see by the above clips, this was a show that held some promise and my imagination both at the same time. When it was cancelled in 1994 I didn’t know what to do with myself. But never fear, at least I had another show to rely on for a couple more years…

Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego? (Apparently she’s STILL never been captured for longer than one night, yee haw).

Let’s fast forward to the 3rd part of this same episode, where they had to place these little alarm-Tensabarrier looking things on countries to win a trip to ANYWHERE in NORTH AMERICA (my destination would be Portland, of course). This video starts with the Tourist station. (Patty Larceny was a hottie too — but alas, blonde.)

I seriously believe that when WITWICS was cancelled in favor of Where in TIME is Carmen Sandiego, was when edutainment went downhill. PBS still airs Mister Rogers and Sesame Street to their credit, but nothing near those educational and entertaining shows like Square One and WITWICS. RIP Square One. RIP WITWICS. And RIP Lynne Thigpen, the Chief.

So where, oh where is all of today’s edutational television? We are seriously dumbing down our kids. Just watch Nick Jr. or Noggin for awhile and you’ll see this generation of children is in Dire Straits.

Although I must admit, I am a big fan of Yo Gabba Gabba!

Um, maybe I shouldn’t have admitted that. Or even posted the video.

I’m outta here. I’m gonna go…hide…under that rock…kthxbye.

The Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir will be leading worship and their pastor, Jim Cymbala, will be sharing the Word tonight at James River Assembly. The doors open at 5 and the shindig starts at 7 so if you wanna, come on out to Ozark tonight.

If you run into me and greet me you get 100 Brewer Bucks.

We have 7-8 inches of snow in our front yard here in Republic, and at least a foot of the powdery stuff where the wind has blown it into drifts. I guess it came down hard and fast last night.

Photos forthcoming, after I sleep a few more hours.

My father and I had a great conversation over the phone Saturday night. In fact it was one of the best conversations I’ve ever had with him, on the phone or in person. Normally I am one to share stuff with my mom for whatever reason but Dad and I had a great conversation about the direction of my life.

I shared with him that I was going to post an entry here on the blog about how I miss a bunch of my friends from Washington, Portugal and Virginia. We talked about that for awhile and then we progressed into talking about why I am here in Springfield, and he gave me probably the exact reason why I am here.

See, my dad jokes around a lot but when he’s serious he doesn’t BS or fool around. He was definitely serious Saturday night when he told me my reason for being here.

I’ll rehash it from a first person perspective since I fully believe he spoke the truth 100%.

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