Free stuff is the best kind of stuff

I was hoping to have the video ready for my next post, but after putting a rough cut together, I have realized I don't have enough footage to make something I would want to put my name on. I'm going to wait till I have gathered enough footage to make a something better.
I have been doing a lot of camera work lately. Yesterday I worked camera 1 assist (the camera behind the drums) for sisterhood.  My job originally was to walk behind the camera man  holding cord that is plugged in feeding power to the camera. However, he let me shoot the first two songs so I could get a taste for it. The trickiest part was traveling over the spaghetti of wires that covered the floor while trying to look through a 2 inch view finder of the metal cased 40 pound camera. Then later that night, I was called in to work another camera in C.C. (Conference Center) for Team Night. I'm also working camera 3 again for Wildlife tonight.

Last Tuesday we had forgotten to take the trash down,  so for the past week trash has been piling up in the garage and on the kitchen counters. So when the time came to take the trash down, we were face with the dilemma of having more trash than what would fit in the wimpy little can. But, we have become masters of adaptation. So in the cover of darkness, Bearden and I walked the streets, loaded trash bags in hand, tossing them in our neighbor's half empty cans....Problem solved.

I woke up this morning in a sleeping bag with bandanna around my eyes and ear plugs logged deep in my skull. First I'll explain the sleeping bag. Reason 1.) The other day we found a full mattress abandoned on the side of the road...so of course we had to take it. I'm trying it out right now (we moved my twin in the guest room for when our friends come) and seeing as we don't have any sheets bigger enough to fit it, I'm using a sleeping bag.  Reason 2.) I miss camping...and I needed to try out the sleeping bag I got for Christmas. Reason 3.) Bearden can't sleep without the fan going and i get cold. As for the bandanna, it's to cover my eyes when the sun comes up. The earplugs I had used for working cameras behind the drums, and i figured I'd wear them to sleep in. I remembered the first time I ever used them was at a monster truck rally and my dad showed me how to roll them up and pack them into my ears. I'm remembering a lot of little stuff like that now, which is strange, I thought I would be forgetting memories.
As for this weekend, I'm aching for the mountains. I have talking to heaps of people about them and they all say it's the bee's knees. So I'm going to try going there, even if I have to go alone. It would be good to scout out the area before we plan a camping trip anyway.


 Courage and integrity have been a running theme lately around Hillsong. It makes me glad I got tattooed what I did and when I did. Having the word Integrity embedded in my skin defiantly has been a way of keeping me honest. Which was the reason I got it, to hold me accountable.

“Have the courage to say no. Have the courage to face the truth. Do the right thing because it is right. These are the magic keys to living your life with integrity.” -W. Clement Stone 

Easy-Breezy.

Well, this weekend is wrapping up, so I guess I should give a run down on what's happened.

Friday- We had our inspection...and we rocked it. You could have eaten off any surface in this house over the weekend. It was obvious that the owners and Realtor were surprised that a group of male, American college students could keep their house in such impeccable shape.

I got a much needed haircut. For the past two years (since Africa) I have been keeping my hair cut in a short faux/military style by getting my sister to trim it every other month. I had gotten Leanne's (Canadian) hair dressing sister to cut my hair for half price. It feels great now. 

After the haircut, I had to go to the school library and finish printing off my papers to submit my video assessment, which is actually the first physical assignment we have had to turn in due to Hillsong being a paperless college. If it weren't for my pen pals, I would probably have forgotten how to write. When I finished and dropped off the folder with all my paper work and DVD for the assessment I went home and got myself some sleep before heading back to the church to work cameras for youth. I operated camera 2, the main cam that follows the speaker. I felt like I screwed up a lot, in fact I had dreams later that night that I kept falling asleep for chunks of the service and the director was screaming at me over the coms.

Saturday- I woke up and had the house to myself. I just kind of tried to relax the first part of the day, but I just couldn't take it after a few hours.  I became overwhelmed with restlessness and tired of sitting around at home. I found myself pacing around the house like a tiger in a cage, phone in hand texting everyone I knew to see if the wanted to go out and do something. Finally, the rest of the gang showed up and I talked them into going to get to Pancakes on the Rocks in the city. Everyone had been telling me was the bee's knees, it's kind of like an ihop meets the Varsity. The pancakes here aren't like America, they have alot more substance meat to them..and ice cream. After our diner, we explored the city for some photo ops. Stephan let me use his old camera, so I practiced for filming. I'll put a video up when I get a chance.
 

Sunday (today)- I was supposed to work this morning at church this morning at 7:15, I woke up and my clock said 7. Walking, it takes us around 10-11 minutes to walk to Hillsong...I got there in 3. I got to the control room and there was no body there. I flashed back to what Sophie told me last night "Don't forget to set your clock back an hour!" I jogged back home, poured a tall bowl of cereal, crawled back in bed and tried to laugh at the situation.






If there was one song that I could listen to before I die and leave this earth...this would be it.

Back to school... again.

Well today was the first day back at school. We all gathered in our first class and then our teacher sent us right back out for a break cause the class room was too cold...I know, it sounds wussy. My 7:30 AM English class room at Military college was much colder and we were just lucky if we got out early. But that's how the laid back system works down here. The rest of the classes went about like normal with chapel, TV/media tutorial and finished the day in a quick meeting for equipment booking.

We skipped Power House tonight (youth group for 18-25 year olds) because our first house inspection is on Friday and the owner is coming with his father to examine the house. We gave it a pretty good cleaning on Sunday, so tomorrow we are going to work on detailing the little nooks and crannies. This inspection is especially important because if the owner is not happy with how us five, male, American, college students (all these things have really bad reps over here...hence the reluctance to rent to us in the first place) he can kick us to the curb. Also, Bearden and I's multicam assessment is due on Friday as well, along with another Colour assessment on Monday. So this weekend will be a no-nonsense one.

Writing checks and breaking necks

I suppose it's time to write another entry. It's been a pretty chill break. Sara (Canada) and Sophi (Mexico) have been spending a good bit of time around the "Atlanta House", which honestly has nice way to balance out the overflow of testosterone. Our meals have been hot and hearty and our sink and counters clean. 

Josh practicing Latin dancing, Stephan DJ-ing, girls cooking, and me in the middle of it.

I'm renowned for my bear-hugs...my mam maw told me so.

Yesterday, we went with Sophi to pick up her new hatch at the Suzuki dealership in the city. It was the first time I had ever drove off the lot in a brand new car, and probably will be the last... Dave Ramsey always said to buy used. Stephan drove home because Sophie's license was expired. There was no close calls and we never missed a turn. It reminded me of the first time I drove our rental around last year in Cairns while waiting for my dad to check the standby list at the airport. Driving on the left side of the road is really as hard as you make it, and Stephan played it cool the entire way.

We didn't go surfing today because once again a lack of a ride. I'm starting to consider selling my board for a longer one, a door or small canoe would help me mount the waves quite nicely methinks. 

Instead, today was a lovely lazy one. Chilled out at the house watched a few movies, ate left overs, and filled out  job applications (I'm trying to get a job at Bunnings, it's like an Australian Home Depot). The past few days have been amazing days Colour Conference recovery, I'm actually ready get back in the regular swing of things. Which is probably a good thing because we start back tomorrow.

Here's a few random stories or things I have learned about different cultures (and my own) talking to all these different people from different nationalities:

-In China,  it's perfectly acceptable to hold your bowl up to your gaping mouth and shovel rice in with a clicking pair of chopsticks. Whereas in Korea, all dishware stays table-side and any noise besides quite conversation is considered extremely rude.

-As part of my job working registers, I had to ask each customer if they were interested in donating five dollars to the Queensland flood relief by buying Hillsong's cover of the "It Is Well With My Soul" hymn. One older lady, while I was giving my spiel, waved her hand to cut me off and said "I have cancer. Do you really think I have time to worry about Queensland?" Before I time to come up with anything to  sympathetic to reply,  she handed her card over the counter to me and asked casually "Credit please."

-NO ONE says " Put another shrimp on the barbie." down here! I swear if one more person from back in the states says that again with an embarrassing attempt at an Aussie accent, I'm gonna lose it. In fact, go ahead and toss "You call that a knife? THIS is a knife." and "Crikey" out the window. However, you can tack on a "Hey?" at the end of a sentence where you want people to agree with you. Example: "It's was hot out, HEY?"  if you want to say you like some thing, you could say you are "Keen on it".

-"So the writer who breeds more words than he needs, is making a chore for the reader who reads." — Dr. Seuss....This is the reason I try to keep my blogs from being too lengthy. I know what it's like to go to a blog and be overwhelmed with a massive chunk of text. So I try to just pack it into a a condensed, read-worthy blast of information.

I stumbled upon this picture, and realized the man in the picture is me 50 years from now. The good news I take from this? I have an awesome spread in the mountains by a lake, still wearing flannels and I have have a beard full of wisdom and stories. This is currently the background for my computer.

Also, as always, I go out with a song that in some sort of way seems to fit the entry or that I'm keen on at the moment. I think this works quite nicely...

Thus passes the age Colour Conference.

Well, as of an hour ago we finished up the two week stint of woman's Colour Conference.

I had been put on register for the checking people out at one of the temporary all things Hillsong stores. I wasn't all to thrilled with my job at first, not due to it's lack of glamor, in fact, being a register clerk was pretty legit compared to some of the other jobs. However, math and I have never been on good terms. Before this week I couldn't imagine doing the simple subtractions in my head with the customer staring at their money in my hand tapping their foot with a line of people. However, after I figured out how to use the machines the math part came pretty easy. By the time it was all said and done, I knew more about the customers credit cards than they did. Some of the cards have chips built in them that we could use on a swipe pad, but of the hundreds of people I checked out,  Only 7 were able to use them.

The hours differed for everyone. Mine was from 8 AM till 10 PM. Although the hours were long, we had some generation breaks when all the ladies were in session, which we took the utilized to get off our throbbing, tired feet. It made me miss my old job at BWAC a little bit where I had a chair available to me at any point during the day. But overall, I'm proud to be part of the experience.

The next few days is a little bit of a break for us. Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday we have off. I'm not sure what Monday holds, but tomorrow means sleep and Tuesday means surfing.

I normally try to find a song that sort of relates to the them or feel of my entry...this one is an exception. But I listened to it while walking home and I like the video.

So, there's this pirate right...

Well, today was our our day for getting ready for Colour 2. I was put on the HMA team (Hillsong Music Australia). More or less I spent the majority of the day setting up cardboard displays for Hillsongs new Aftermath album, stocking up the merchandise stands with basically everything  Hillsong has recorded in the past 20 years.
The whole campus had new tents set up, along with the down stairs being transformed into a white walled display room for all things Hillsong. It's hard not to be proud to be apart of something so massive like this. I don't know any other church in the world that could pull something like this off at such a professional caliber while using regular volunteers.

We got done with work at 1, but some of us stayed behind to help the girls with the heart shaped confetti seeing as  going back home and sitting around didn't sound too appealing. Afterward, some people came over and spent the afternoon chill'n  and talking in the hammocks. At night we watched a horrible movie that I had been led to believe was pretty good called "Buried", It's about a guy who wakes up in a coffin underground....90 minutes and a dozen frantic phone calls later, he dies. Roll credits.

But in good news, I got to tell my pirate joke several times today. So it was a good day. Also, this is a good song.

Stood up.

Today, we had planned on devoting to surfing seeing as we had the day off.  My ride was supposed to pick me up at the church this morning. So I made a breakfast made up of 1 orange, 3 eggs (scrambled like a Waffle House pro), and a protien shake (The protien powder was detonated by one of our friends back in the states who sent us a gift card charged with a substantial amount for some of the local stores. Donor, you know who you are and from the bottom of our hearts we thank you). Then, I headed out in the rain ready to brave the waves, surf board underarm, hood over head, and ipod in ears. However, when I got to the church, my ride was no where to be found. After an hour and 1/2 I helped some guy unload a Thrifty moving truck full of Colour Conference supplies then trudged home in disappointment. Josh and Bearden's ride showed up later and they were able to go, which honestly was fine by me cause they seem to be far more into then I am.

A few hours later Stephan and I headed back to the church to finish shooting the last clip for our Exchange festival video. It was a shot of a year holding up a sign, it took all of 2 minutes film. I then went to the Swim School down the road and dropped off my application. It's unlikely that I'll be getting any work with them despite my certifications or my WSI position at my old pool seeing as they only take instructors they personally trained...a course which takes 30 hours to complete. 

We then met up with some of our Canadian friends and grabbed some groceries for chicken tacos and a movie. Later we all came back to the house and chilled out for a little while. It's good to have a group that we can just veg out with.

In other news, my new back pack came in the mail today! It's a Kelty bag that I have been wanting for sometime now, and after receiving some "fun money" I was able to finally get it. I'm completely thrilled with it. After looking it over and examining it, I can see that it was designed very shrewdly by an avid backpacker. Kelty bags have a hump placed over the lower back to help offset the weight, it actually helps TREMENDOUSLY with load adjustment.  Also, it has a MOLLE system (a series of nylon loops sewn onto the bag for attaching things) on the bottom for strapping sleeping bags, which would have came in handy on my Colorado trip last August. It's also MUCH lighter than my North Face top-loader (which means it has a lid on top that you have to unzip and reach in to get to your gear.)