Take a look at my mood, folks. It's up at the top of the page. As of today, my mood has been changed to happy.

In spite of not having much money to live on until I get my check...I have money.
In spite of not having a dryer...um...having to work to come up with something...uhhh....I have clothes.
In spite of having a broken toe...it's getting better...and I have feet.
In spite of feeling as though my time in Concord will be ending soon...if it doesn't, it's something I'll be okay with.

Of course, the last time I felt this way, something catastrophic happened, so I'm a bit nervous.

In March 2004, I was working at Cold Stone full-time and going to school full-time. I had been back in Greenville for almost 6 months, and my grandmother's stuff was still in the living room. I also had not really unpacked my stuff because I didn't want to be there in Greenville. I has just committed to being part of a ministry in Greenville, helping them out with running their sound.

I had gotten off of work, and I was thinking about where I was in my life. Even though Greenville was not where I wanted to be, I decided that I would make the most of it. When I got home, I threw on some music and started packing my grandmother's stuff in boxes. First I was going to tackle the living room and get it like I wanted it, before moving on to the rest of the house.

After about 45 minutes, I noticed that the music sounded sort of funny. There was kind of a whistling noise sometimes. It was distracting, so I turned off the music. Then I said something to my cat, and my own voice had that whistling sound.

This was not good.

I went next door to my parents' house, and on the way in, my sister was going out. She greeted me and her voice had the whistling noise.

That was the beginning of my problems with hearing loss. It came after a profound sense of contentment with the way my life was...so forgive me for being a bit jumpy.

Tonight, Houston was at Underground for the Guyana service. Everyone on the Guyana team spoke about their experience during our trip.

No, I haven't forgotten about the Guyana section of my web site. I've been busy with other things, like trying to find a job. Now that I have one, I can start trying to finish what I had started.

The videos I made about Guyana are coming soon.

My foot has been taped up since Thursday, and today I changed the bandages. This is a picture of the bottom of my right foot. You can see the bruising. Apparently I hurt my toe and the base of my toe. It's getting easier to walk on, which is good.

Hello, new employer. I start Monday.

Well, it hurts.

I called a few friends of mine that were nurses, and spoke with another online. The general consensus is that there wasn't a whole lot that can be done about a broken toe other than taping it and icing it down.

Being the Internet junkie that I am, I had looked up what to do about a broken toe. Those resources said basically the same thing.

My friend Carolyn came over here soon after I broke my toe. She was an amazing amount of help. She offered to finish fixing the sandwhich I was in the middle of making when I tripped over the kettlebell. She rummaged through everything in my freezer to discover that I did have ice after all, which she put in a plastic bag. She taped up my toe to the other ones and gave me pills to ease the pain.

Then I laid down on the couch with my foot propped up, and Carolyn sat in the recliner. We watched Amelie, which is a terrific movie about a young girl who lives in France. About halfway through the film, the pills started to kick in and I got buzzed. Then I got sleepy. About 30 minutes after Carolyn left, I got sleepy and took a nap for a few hours.

My foot is propped up, and has ice on it right now. I'm keeping weight off of it as much as possible, but I still have to get around.

All in all, I've had better days.

So I tripped over one of Jimmmy's weights, and felt a *CRACK* in my foot. I looked, and the fourth toe (next to the small one) was pointing in an odd direction. I moved it back and heard another *CRACK*.

What wonderful joy this is. All the jobs I've applied for require standing for long periods of time.

Now to determine if I should go to the ED and get further into debt or not.

For reference...my good foot.

So the phantom roommate, Jimmy, unexpectedly shows up today to move out, taking all his stuff.

I knew that at some point he was going to be moving out. What I did not know is that the washer and dryer both belong to him.

Due to the short nature of his notice (i.e. I opened the door to retrieve a package and found him and his dad parked in the driveway with a pickup truck), I was unable to wash any clothes before the dryer was carted off.

I've been trying to cut back on my spending. Having to shell out money to wash clothes does not help matters at all.

Thanks, man.

Good news: I have a license plate!
Bad news: They took away CHKMAGNT, and I would have had to pay $30 to get it back.

I was quite angry.

Time to affix my new plate to the car, get some gas, and then apply for jobs everywhere I can.

The other night I went to Wal-Mart with my friend Carolyn, and we began perusing various pictures. Nearby were some picture frames. I couldn't resist capturing the moment.

...and the women were in the kitchen, relating to each other.

What was I doing? Why, taking pictures and thinking of witty comments, of course!

I was at Nate's birthday party on Saturday, and to my immense surprise, the men and women had segregated themselves. The men were in the living room watching television...

Hmm. I might have to watch this when it comes out.

My brother is probably very psyched.

If so, go here to install an extension that will stop the videos from playing all at once.

The video for the day was mostly made, and I was shooting footage during worship when I had an amazing idea. Since the theme of camp was "Journey," why not have the videos start out with kids talking about their own spiritual journey? Soon after that, I ran into Adam and he agreed to tell me his story.

The hot dogs you see here were not cooked. While shooting the contest, I became nauseous from the smell of all the half-eaten hot dogs. I had to back away for a few moments to regain my composure (i.e. gag and try to keep from throwing up) before I could resume filming.

The opening for this video is, I think, the best out of the entire week. I love the song "Getaway Car," and think that this video really has a fun attitude to it.

This video was fun to put together. I knew before going to camp that "Move" is one of the songs I wanted to do. It became pretty difficult to keep changing to an interesting clip every time the guy says "Move" because he says it so much!

The story of Tim was fun, if a bit time consuming.

No insightful thoughts here, though I must say I like the way that the "Day 2" intro turned out.

This was such a difficult video to make. "I Saw the Light" is a great song, but something about it (sorry, I don't know enough about music to identify the characteristic) made it very difficult to edit. I tried changing the song two or three times, but somehow this particular song felt right.

I recorded more than the three interviews you see, but due to the extremely short nature of "I saw the light," I wasn't able to include them. I didn't have the patience to try and loop the song, either. The music is important because it makes the interviews less boring. This is not to say that the kids being interviewed were boring...they were not. It's more a matter of most people not being very good public speakers.

Nicole's interview went very well, which is why I was able to include hers without any music. It also went with the theme I tried to employ for each of the videos...having someone talk about their journey before the video began. Unfortunately I wasn't able to strictly stay with that, as you see from the video for day 4.

The altar time on Day 3 was amazing. Several people were healed of scoliosis and asthma. There was a guy that came to camp with a knee brace and crutches, unable to put any weight on that leg. He received prayer and was healed. He took off the leg brace and quit using the crutches. Stuff like that can't be faked. Then there's the guy in the video that has his arm healed. Then there's my experience...but that's another blog entry altogether.

This is the video for the last day of youth camp. I worked on it all night, and around the halfway point of "Butterfly" is where I started to get a little loopy and just threw footage in there without caring if it fit with the music or not. If you watch it enough times, you'll be able to see it.

Also, I'm not one to use pointless special effects. You can only watch someone jumping into a lake a few times before it gets boring, which is why I use the reverse motion. Not to mention when someone jumps out of a lake, it sort of goes along with the song's theme about flying. It seemed to fit.

I listened to Butterfly (or parts of it) at least 50 times while making the video. Consequently, it was stuck in my head the rest of the next day.

This is my friend Nicole, who was almost unable to be at youth camp. She was there, though, and it was good to see her. The guy in the background is her boyfriend, Justin, and he seems like a nice person.

I took other pictures, but apparently they didn't upload. I have to find them. And I must upload the camp videos.

I took this picture a week ago, and now I have no idea what witty thing I was going to say with it.

How sad.

I have safely arrived in Concord. Tomorrow is youth camp, and I'm looking forward to it.

Marker board: $14
Magic marker: $1.27
Being mentioned in my blog because your sign is funny: priceless

Please pray for me and my ride as we head back to Concord.

Since I'm in town I decided to visit my maternal grandmother, who is in a nursing home. I haven't seen her since the last time I was in town, and I spent about 90 minutes there. She's got Alzheimer's, and cannot remember much of the recent past. Now, though, she's having trouble remembering the distant past as well. She didn't remember how old she was when she first got married, or what past job she used to have.

Instead of being upset about it, though, she just kind of takes it in stride. If she can't remember, she says so and we move on. She did say some interesting things, like the fact that God comes to visit her sometimes. He tells her that he loves her and tells her what to do to stay on the right path. Alas, I'm not sure how much trouble you can get into in a nursing home.

She also said that she can see into my future. I asked if she could see into anyone else's future, and she said no. I brought it up a few more times later to see if she changed her story, but she was quite adamant. Apparently I will make it to heaven, and I'll marry a girl and be married for a very long time. I just need to be on the lookout for a black girl to make sure she doesn't get in the way of things. It was pretty odd.

Overall, though, the conversation went well. She said she wants to take a vacation from the nursing home, and she mentioned being tired a lot. Some things she said were nonsensical, but I suppose that comes with the territory. She's sad that my cousin Justin never comes to see her, and I tried to explain his reasons for not visiting.

I love my grandmother, but I hate to see her like this.

Two weeks shy of three years ago, I adopted a tiny kitten.

Today I am leaving her with my parents.

I shall miss her, and I'm sure she will miss me.

Let's hope that this doesn't go on too long. A war in the Middle East involving Israel could quickly inflame tensions.

Last night my father decided to have a bread sandwich.

I couldn't make this stuff up.

The next time you're running from a crazed maniac at the prom, you'll want these light-up heels. They'll be sure to give you away in record time! Available at Wal-mart.

No one on the face of the earth knows how to relax with the same degree of intensity as a cat.

Tonight at my parents' church, there was much shofar-blowing, jumping up and down, and marching around the church.

Definitely not my preferred style of church service, but God's presence was evident, which is something I really can't argue with.

Sometimes Christianity can be so surreal.

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Tab is starting to settle in, but every now and then she looks completely startled.

I'm sure this will set Christian tongues a-wagging, but a picture like this was too good to pass up.

Besides, you never know when blackmail will come in handy.

Tonight I went to a worship service that was being held at a local bar, which used to be a strip club. It was a great concept. Alas, the execution wasn't that good. Instead of attracting people that do not normally attend the worship service, it seemed to just be a way for the Silver Bullet to make some money off cover charges.

I did not have my earplugs with me, and the volume was uncomfortably loud. I asked my cousin what it sounded like to him, and he said it was fine...it didn't sound like it was too loud. Apparently while I have seen improvement with my noise tolerance, I'm still not totally better.

Spent some time with my cousin, Justin, today. We had some crazy fun, yo.

Well, here I be.

Goodbye, phone.

Soon my web site will go down, which will be followed by my internet shutting off.

Ain't life grand?

My friend Zack showed us a public access program that he had recorded. Not only were the people in it hilarious, he told us how he had called to request that they sing "Victory in Jesus" two times...after they had already sung it at the beginning of the program. It was great.

This story is about a study that's been done and conjectures that a common ancestor to every person was alive as soon as 2,000 years ago.

They mention this briefly in passing, but the thing I find interesting is that if they work their way back, we can figure out how long human beings have been around.

But anyway...read the article. It's interesting.

At this rate, I should have the entire thing up by Halloween!

I'll try to pick up the pace somewhat.

Day 2

me: what are you trying to say
real_christian: you made a comment sayinf who is Jesus
me: right
real_christian: are you ok?
me: sure. I'm fine.
real_christian: because no one who lives on planet earth has not heard who jESUS is
real_christian: at least those who speak english
me: you're wrong about that
real_christian: nope
real_christian: the gospel has been preached nearly everywhere
me: you start out with so many assumptions
real_christian: again,..i'm not saying everyone in the world knows,....but for someone in western society or at least ones that have computers cannot be unaware of him
real_christian: ok,...lets asume you havent heard of him
real_christian: thats cool with me
me: they can be unaware of the claims about him
real_christian: he showed the world clearly who he is
real_christian: his grace is empty and he lives forever
real_christian: grave
me: grace...heh
real_christian: there is plenty of historical fact and documentation that proves his life and sacrifice
me: it proves that he exists
real_christian: not to mention thousands who profess to know him personally
me: only thousands?
real_christian: no one is alive that witnessed him two thousand years ago,..so you have to rely on other credible means
me: such as
real_christian: no,..millions
real_christian:
real_christian: my mistake
real_christian: countless actually
me: there is a finite number
real_christian: and people by the thousands throughout time would not have given their lives for someone that wasnt real
real_christian: tell me about you
real_christian: where are you living
me: I'm someone that loves Jesus. But even more than that I love to waste the time of people who witness in Christian chat rooms.
real_christian: are you posessed by satan?
me: now why would you ask something like that
real_christian: because i dont sense the Holy Spirit of God with you,...you seem antagonistic,.....and though you say you love Jesus ,...you say you want to waste the time of Christian witnesses
real_christian: you are speaking in contradictions
me: I'm definitely antagonistic
me: I only said I want to waste the time of those who witness in Christian chat rooms
real_christian: doesnt matter what you call yourself,....there are only two camps,...you are either for him or against him
me: it's like running into a lightbulb store waving a lit flashlight
me: pointless
real_christian: you arent wasting my time
me: why not go into the "secular" rooms and wait for God to give you an opportunity?
me: or better yet, witness to a real live person?
real_christian: the jokes on you,....you are hearing GOD'S word and it never returns void
real_christian: you will be serving one of two masters and love one and hate the other
real_christian: there's no third option
me: if I confess with my mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in my heart that God has raised him from the dead, I will be saved
me: I do believe, and I've confessed
me: so like it or not, I'm a Christian too
real_christian: then why say you are antagonistic,...Jesus was not
me: you're kidding, right?
real_christian: so you cant claim to have him if you are walking in unGodliness
real_christian: he said so
me: Jesus shook up the order of the day
real_christian: yup
me: he called the religious leaders a bunch of snakes
real_christian: and still does
real_christian: umm hmm
me: he was definitely antagonistic
me: and who said I was walking in ungodliness?
me: not I
real_christian: so you payed a little attention in sunday school,..but now Jesus wants take you to a higher place in him
me: a little attention? you've no idea
real_christian: he said,..except you be born again,..you cannot see the kingdom
me: what a cliche
me: there's always a higher place
real_christian: Jesus can change your heart and life
me: He did
me: He does
real_christian: he wants to reveal to you the kind of life and peace that you have no clue of
real_christian: the world doesnt provide it
real_christian: how old are you
me: I'm 26
me: I presume you're 27
real_christian: you presume wrong
me: Christ did not come to bring peace, but a sword
me: my condolences
real_christian: yup
me: how old are you
real_christian: 48,..and it'd not a bad thing,..i cannot do anything about my age anyway
real_christian: but if you were wise,..you would learn from people who are older
me: you're making so many assumptions about me
real_christian: how so
real_christian: not assumptions
real_christian: a tree is known by its fruit
me: that I'm not a true christian...that I disrespect you because of your age...that I'm living an ungodly life
real_christian: i dont pretend to say whether you are a true Christian,....you yourself are making assumptions,...because i never said that
real_christian: and the other things as well
me: "i dont sense the Holy Spirit of God with you"
real_christian: i never said anything about your disrespecting or living unGodly
me: "doesnt matter what you call yourself,....there are only two camps"
real_christian: stop a sec and think about your words
real_christian: we are told top use words wisely
me: "you cant claim to have him if you are walking in unGodliness"
real_christian: if i said something,..then you can say what i said,...but you interpret things
me: all conversation is interpreted
real_christian: i say that you arent walking in him because of the things you said
real_christian: God's word is clear
real_christian: i cna easily show where you are not in live with his word
me: okay go for it
real_christian: no,..thaqts not true
real_christian: actually i did already,..but ,...
real_christian: the first thing of,...i am antagonistic,.....do you know what that word means
real_christian: ?
me: One who antagonizes
real_christian: because is is not of God
me: where does the Bible say that?
real_christian: if you walking in his Spirit and have the Holy Spirit guiding you when you read,....you will know and have aq sure foundation
real_christian: the bible says the hOLY Spirit is loving and does no harm to anyone,.,...and the bible says if anyone offends,..they are displeasing to him
real_christian: its not rocket science
me: where does the Bible say that?
real_christian: hang on
me: The Holy Spirit definitely killed Ananias and Sapphira
real_christian: they were in rebellion to God
me: but the holy spirit harmed them
me: and you said that he doesn't do that
real_christian: we are not given the authority to be antagonistic,..but are told to walk in love
real_christian: only God can make judgements
me: We are given the authority to bind and to loosen
me: do you not know we will judge angels?
me: we must make good judgments here to prepare
real_christian: he told james and john they didnt know what spirit they were being under,..when they wanted to destroy the samaritans
me: they only wanted to kill an entire city
me: tsk tsk
real_christian: he said if you offend nither in tongue or deed you are approved and good
me: what's the reference?
real_christian: sec
real_christian: james 3:2
me: we turn the whole animal
real_christian: huh/
real_christian: ?
me: oops that was 3:3
me: 2We all stumble in many ways. If anyone is never at fault in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to keep his whole body in check.
me: how is that relevant to our discussion?
real_christian: my bible says "for in many things we offend all,...if any man offend not in word,...the same is a perfect man....
me: you must be using KJV
real_christian: able to bridle also the whole body
real_christian: yup
real_christian: but other versions say about the same
real_christian: i think its clear that you should be offensive with the tongue if you are a professing Chrisitan
me: the greek word for "offend" is ptaio
me: it means "to cause one to stumble or fall "
me: your tongue should not cause someone else to sin
real_christian: be careful not to heep head knowledge on yourself,.....because he said his words are Spirit and they are truth,......
me: offense is a state of mind
real_christian: you are told not to strive about words to no profit
real_christian: and you know better,..but are seeking to justify yourself
real_christian: ya know what?.....you have my prayers,....and i wont "waste time" with you anymore,....not since you are not humble and open to learn,..i'm called to witness,..not baby sit
me: why do you keep assigning motives to me?
me: thank you for your sincere Christian love
real_christian: Lord bless you...if you seek him with your whole heart,..you will find him
me: peace out

The downside of sparklers is that unless you're running and jumping with them, you feel pretty silly. And if you are running and jumping and you're older than 10...you look pretty silly.

I went to a bonfire, and one of the ingredients was an old Christmas tree. Brandon lit the fire and it was crackling merrily. Then he blew on it, and we got the result you see here. T'was quite impressive.

For the past six weeks, I've been without a paying job. I've had a job, but unfortunately the money part has not yet materialized. I've also been without transportation for four of those weeks, so I've been unable to work anywhere else.

As a result of not having money, bills have not been paid. Very soon...probably tomorrow, my web site is going to go down.

Soon after that my phone service will be shut off.

I will at least have e-mail. Until my internet service is also shut down.

All this is said not for the purpose of whining or begging for money, but simply to let you know what's going on when you type in "DemonKilla.com" and see a frickin' huge ACCOUNT SUSPENDED page.

None of you out there are the solution to my problems. This is quite a Christian thing to say(however, I am a Christian, so I guess I'm entitled)...but I know that God is my source. He'll take care of the things I need.

Unfortunately, things like internet and phone and web site hosting are not really "needs." They are ultimately conveniences. Conveniences I will have in the future, but apparently not now.

This is no one's fault but my own, for trusting that a friend of mine could do what he said he was going to do without first demanding proof. The only thing I'd do differently is ask for money up front. I really do believe in what my friend is doing and think it's a great idea.

Now that this entry has cheered you up, go hug a tree or something. I know I will. That, at least, is free.