Weblog
Saturday, 06 December 2008
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mobile homelessness = people who live in cars
Stopped by and donated a bag of canned foods at the Junky Car Club annual rally, said hey to Mike Foster, and met a handful of Catalyst crew, including LV Hanson, there with the Catalyst road trip van.
Heard an incredible story of a lady with her son who are homeless and living out of her car. [ht: charlestlee] Here’s the video of Kathleen, who lives in a van with her 7 month old son Ezekiel and her dog Zodi:
There are an estimated 5,000 people in Orange County that are mobile homeless! Probably some in your ‘hood too.
Wednesday, 03 December 2008
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which tie should I wear?
I’ve got a company Christmas party to attend tonight. Which tie should I wear?
I’ll wear the one that wins this poll, based on results at 5:00pm Central.
Background info: Company is a Christian non-profit ministry about to turn 25 years old. All staff and most board members will be present. Some of the others will bring their respective spouse. I’m married, but spouse not attending. I’ll need to be on good behavior. I’m not drinking (due to medication.) Add a comment before 12 noon Central if you need more context info to better inform your vote.
[update] the bright green tie won - here’s a fuzzy pic –
Monday, 01 December 2008
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free conference with top leaders
It’s been a long time coming, and it’s now around the corner. A $0 conference for Christian leaders to gather! For years the rest of the world has had unconferences that have shared valuable content and facilitated engaging conversations for $0 registration, but it was very hard to find a free Christian conference for church leaders. (Granted there’s a certain value to the traditional conference format with productions on the main stage and breakouts / seminars / workshops, and some even are profitable ventures, there are also other innovative ways in the Web 2.0 world.)
In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I’m so grateful that Charles Lee is coordinating an unconference called The Idea Camp on February 27-28, 2009 in Irvine, California. SAVE THE DATES! Here’s what The Idea Camp is about:
The Idea Camp is a free hybrid conference for idea-makers to share, network, and implement ideas. We are gathering some of the most innovative and creative leaders from around the country (this means YOU!) to share ideas, intentionally network, and move collaboratively into idea-making. Whether your passion is church leadership, non-profit work, social entrepreneurialism, technology, media, creativity, culture making, church planting, spiritual formation, compassionate justice, etc., this is the conference for YOU!
The Facebook Group for Idea Camp is facebook.com/group.php?gid=41051955597 and using a Ning.com powered social networking engine, conference information is dynamically and collaboratively updated. See the list of people who will be presenting and/or facilitating conversations at The Idea Camp; it already includes: Brad Abare, Greg Atkinson, Eric Bryant, Mike Foster, Dave Gibbons, Jeff Shinabarger, Cynthia Ware, Robert Yang of Kindlejoy.com, me, and more! More will be added between now and then, and you could be part of it too!
New to the idea of unconferences? It’s where no one pays to get in, no one gets paid, the playing field is level, and everyone has skin in the game. Read more about it cf. what is an unconference, understanding the unconference.
Call out others you’d love to see there. I’m calling out Dan Kimball, Erwin McManus, James Choung, Ed Stetzer, Dallas Willard, John Bishop, Donald Miller. Come on down!
Sunday, 30 November 2008
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do you speak fluent English?
Since you’re reading this blog, you are probably a fluent English speaker. I’ve recently received this inquiry from a graduate student in China, and she’d like your help in filling out this questionnaire. Here is the email request [sic] for your consideration to participate:
I am a third year graduate in Xi’an International Studies University (西安外国语大学） majoring in Modern Linguistics. And now I am working on my MA thesis, which is about the pragmatic transfer in Chinese EFL learners’ refusal speech act. Thus I need to collect the English from both the native English speakers and Chinese learners of English and then to make a comparison between the two groups. The questionnaire is taken from Beebe et al.(1990), which was a “Discourse Completion Test” and now I need to find some Americans, or at least English speakers (English as one’s mother tongue) to fill in those blanks provided. In the attachment there is the questionnaire, would you please have a look at it? And if possible,would you please ask your friends to do it for me at their convinience? I sincerely hope you can help me.
What I did to fill out this questionnaire is to copy/paste the web document into an email, and filled out my response. Send the completed questionnaire to discourse@djchuang.com
The questionnaire is anonymous, so your name will not be published in any famous annals of thesis archives. It took me 15 minutes to fill out; you could probably finish faster.
Friday, 28 November 2008
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upgrade to 13,000 feet
who but God knew what would happen this week when I walked up to a rental car counter without reservation, and we received a free upgrade for our economy rental, and we drove around town in a white Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo.. our itinerary was loosely set around a few days in Albuquerque, with day-trip excursion to Santa Fe, then a few days in Durango.. Thursday we decided to let the day go, put ourselves out there, and see what would happen.. a terribly risky day for an INFJ to see what an out-of-control day with an ENFP behind the wheel..
we drove north on the windy mountainous 550 to Silverton, a small rustic mining town with brightly painted storefronts off of Main Street, and a visit to NA Graphics, which holds the files to the history of all the Vandercook letterpresses, one of which sits in our garage now converted to art studio.. and from there we’d go four-wheeling.. either up Kendall Mountain that overlooks small-town Silverton (a trail I had already looked up at webejeepin.com), or take the 45-minute drive through Ophir Pass to Telluride (through word-of-mouth with some Silverton locals).. we (I) opted for the greater unknown and tried Ophir Pass, no map in hand, no clue where it’d lead (and no clue how we’d get back to Durango)..
wow, what a drive, first time four-wheeling, holding on for dear life with a ‘death-grip’ on the steering wheel (and now feeling it in my left wrist), as we wound up the mountain pass, wheels a feet from the edge of the cliff side, and up into the mountain glaciers and a light drizzle to sprinkle grace into our new ventures into the unknown.. an added thrill to see my father-in-law glee in delight at the awesome sights..
so about an hour later, we wind up in Telluride, where they’re in the midst of a Bluegrass festival.. we didn’t go to the main stage, and didn’t know much about the town, but quickly picked up that this was no ordinary small town.. it was more of a ritzy-glam town, an excursion for the well-to-do, and Roo spotted an art gallery, into which we strolled, and saw some exquisite artwork, where pieces have sold for $500,000 recently(!!).. more visual beauty to the delight of my wife..
our attempt to return on another mountain pass, Tom Boy Road, turned out to be more than we bargained for.. the UPS driver said it’d be just as quick to take this “shortcut” than to take the circuitous highway route.. Tom Boy Road took us, eventually to Imogene Pass, altitude 13,000 feet, and we couldn’t go any further!.. we had to turn around, go back to Telluride, and take the paved highway, returning home by like 9:30pm, missing dinner..
cliches of breath-taking views, exhilirating, unbelievable, beauty, wonder, et al, could be words to etch here, or photos frail attempt to capture a glimpse of what we saw.. and having viewed the photos that night, neither words nor pictures can describe or capture the experience.. it has to be experienced, and it was wondrous to experience it.. would I have done it if it were planned, or if I were in a vehicle smaller than a Grand Cherokee? probably not! I’m not one for risky adventures nor heights, frankly if I lingered much more to savor the moment, I might’ve gotten queazy.. and such was the case when we were up at 13,000-feet of Imogene Pass, me shivering a bit in the 30-degree chill, and didn’t trigger the panoramic feature of my new digital camera to capture the view of being so high up..
a most exhilirating day filled with beautiful sights and sounds, with a little residual survivor-guilt for missing a dinner engagement that was scheduled at the top of the day..
[update 6/23/04: photos now online!]
djchuang
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- Name: dj
- Gender: Male
- Member Since: 7/9/2001
