Oh, How Priorities Change

This may answer the question posed by Aaron on my last entry. :)

On Wednesday, the day after Christmas, I went into work as usual. I got to my desk, and my boss came in and asked if I had a minute. I went into the HR person's office and found out that I was being let go. That's right, I no longer have a job. I cleaned out my cubicle and left. I was there for maybe fifteen minutes. It was not due to anything incredibly wrong I had done, but it just seems that they simply didn't think I was the right fit for that position.

It is a little odd; I had just (as reported in a previous entry) had an interview at another company. After that, I realized how much I like my job at Priority and how I much I felt like this was the place I was supposed to be. Evidently, the big man upstairs (a.k.a. God) had other plans. I'm sure something else will come around. I've already contacted my previous employer (FLS), where I left on excellent terms, to see if maybe they could give me a job, even temporarily while I find something more permanent. I have one other job lead besides that as well. Something will come up.

Fortunately, my wife still has her job, and we've been doing rather well financially, so this shouldn't be that big of a setback, as long as I don't go too long without another job.

That being said, my increase in free time may allow me to spend more time writing The Lords of Sargoff story, and more time to play Everquest II and other such fun things.

Another little silly effect from me losing my job is regarding the Cooper Bowl page I had put up to track how my family members did when compared to each other in picking the winners of the college bowl games. I had hosted that on my work's server, which I no longer have access to. It also seems they are being quick, as that page has already been removed (as they must have just deleted my folder named joel on the server). Impressive.

So anyway, it's been an interesting couple days, and a joyous end to the Christmas season. :) In the end, though, I know that God has a plan for this, and I know good will come from it. Priority must not have been where I should be, at least not anymore. I look forward to seeing where life takes me.

Sadly, I had a bunch of websites that I could use for future Link of the Days and listed in a text file on my work computer. Which, of course, I no longer have access to. But no fear, I found one quickly today. Whew.

LotD: Card-Stacking Record Broken. Holy cow.

And To All A Good Night

Ah, Fridays. Ah, Fridays before 4 day weekends. Ah, Fridays before Christmas weekends. Ahhhh.

Merry Christmas to everyone. This will (I assume) be my last posting before Christmas day. I hope all of you have a wonderful and blessed holiday, and I hope the Christmas Jedi Master brings you lots of goodies. I will report back on the 26th on our Christmas weekend. I'm sure you're excited. :)

The good news, though, is that my wife no longer is working on Christmas day. She will still work a night shift on Christmas Eve, but we get to spend all of the 25th at home together, which is good and brings me joy.

LotD: Prison Escsape (Thank You Andy Dufresne). Some escapees took a page from The Shawshank Redemption when they escaped from prison.

The Anti-Ticket

Our volleyball games last night went well; we won all 3 games. Now the league will be split in two parts, and our 11-1 record will be reset to 0-0, and I assume we will begin facing tougher competition, which should make for some exciting games, which are really good fun, win or lose.

I was trying to further define the country itself in The Lords of Sargoff, and I feel like I may need to redo the map I posted earlier, moving some things around, and making the overall size of the country smaller. And, as opposed to what I had suggested in an early comments discussion, there will probably not be other countries too close by.

Tonight, my wife and I are going out to eat, and will watch Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which I bought for my wife on the day it came out on DVD. What a good husband I am. :)

LotD: Police Reward Good Drivers With Coffee. While this is better than a ticket, as a non-coffee-drinker, I'd rather it be usable at Best Buy.

One Blog Entry to Rule Them All (Not the Maul!)

I now have a 20-chapter outline for The Lords of Sargoff. A good bit of the first five chapters is already written, though it needs to be edited and expanded. I am rather pleased with what I've been able to put together so far. Not that it means this will be any exceptional work of fiction, but it will be good fun to write. It's interesting, trying not to fall into the clichés and just use all of the usual fantasy-type things. Granted, there are wizards and magic, but I've tried to be creative and not make it too similar to other stories. For instance, in the story there is an orb that has exceptional power, but I try not to dwell too much on it. There is no "one orb to rule them all" or other such aspect. Hopefully the story ends up being as original as I hope. :)

If you are so inclined (and who wouldn't be?), you may visit The Cooper Bowl, the little page I put together for tracking how us Coopers (including nearly-3 year old Jenna) did on picking the winners of the bowl games. There are 8 of us total. The site is all database driven; all I need to do is mark the winner of each game to the database, and the page will do the rest. Very exciting. :)

Tonight is our fourth week of volleyball, and our last week before getting split into two leagues and having our records reset. Hopefully we win tonight, but we'll probably end up in the higher of two leagues no matter what. It's good fun no matter what, of course!

LotD: Can You Run It? Runs a diagnostic on your computer and compares it against the minimum specifications for a whole slew of games to see whether it could run it. A pretty nifty little tool.

A Sargoffian Christmas

Today at work is the "Holiday Luncheon" at the Wildfire Restaurant in Eden Prairie. While company-related events in general are usually not all too exciting, I normally don't mind them. In this case, I get free food from a restaurant I've never been too, I get to spend part of the day away from the office, and I get to go home after the luncheon. So it's not all too bad. I also found out today that I get a holiday bonus here. I didn't even know we got them. My bonus isn't too much, especially because I've only worked there 3 months of the year, so obviously I won't get as much as those who have been here all year. But it's still a little extra cash, which is always nice.

I've decided to post the current version of chapter one for The Lords of Sargoff. This is almost more of a preface, as it would only be about 2 pages long. In the previous chapter one that I had posted, I had mentioned Lord Hamrin, but he's actually in this chapter. This is sets the stage for events to be explained later. Chapter two would actually start several years after this chapter. Let me know if it makes the rest of the story sound incredibly uninteresting. :) This is, of course, not anywhere close to final. A lot of work is left to be done. But I've made a lot of progress on the overall storyline so far.

LotD: Star Wars Toys that Never Made It. Good for a laugh! :)

Chapter One, The Lords of Sargoff

The room was dimly lit with several candles mounted on the walls, and creature-like silhouettes of shadow danced on the sides. A deep basket on the floor emitted a faint green light from its contents. Stretched to the ceiling were shelves full of books, none of which were labeled on their spine. One shelf contained bright colored liquids in small glass tubes. Paintings and small statues, most of different types of creatures, covered a majority of wall and table space. A statue of a two-headed dragon looked as if it was about to strike a small human whose sword had been cast aside, with an expression of horror on his face. Any visible wall was of dark stone, slightly darker than the stone of the ceiling and floor.

In the middle of the room sat a man in a black chair of sleek marbled stone. He wore a dark blood-red colored robe and a twisted smile. The man’s smooth dark red hair shined in the candlelight, and yet it appeared to nearly glow of its own accord. His open palm held a small round black rock with a thin green line around it, and he seemed to glare at it with a certain amount of loathing.

Though the man appeared to be no older than his mid thirties and in good health, he moved at the speed of one much older. He did not seem to have much physical energy, but his eyes burned with desire to escape; there was no fear in them, but they were filled with a sense of purpose.

He stretched out his other hand and turned that palm face up as well; he curved his fingers inward, and a small white ball of light slowly appeared between them and spun wildly, and then vanished after several seconds.

The door to the room opened suddenly, but the man did not remove his gaze from the round black rock.

“We have collected them, my Lord Hamrin,” came the voice of the man who had entered. He too wore a red robe, but of a much duller color.

“All fifty?” Lord Hamrin replied, his voice dark and stormy. “I hope they are as I wanted them to be.” The man at the door shuttered in fear, then attempted to regain his composure.

“Yes, my lord. All seem to be possible candidates.”

“Good. Now send word to those who would care about this theft, and to all surrounding areas: show up on the castle grounds one week from today, or choose to never see your loved ones alive again.”

“Yes, my lord. What is your plan for them?”

“Don’t worry on the details. Throw the prisoners in the dungeons and make sure they are treated with the respect they deserve, and spread the message I have given you to the countryside.”

“Yes, my lord.”

The man left the room and closed the door behind him. Lord Hamrin continued to stare at the rock and created a white ball of essence with his other hand, but this time the essence did not disappear. He slowly moved the rock toward the floating essence, until he held the rock directly in the floating ball’s center. The green line around its outside began pulsating brightly with green light. Lord Hamrin grinned widely and placed the rock into the basket on the floor to his side. Forty-nine identical rocks with pulsating green lines had already rested inside the basket.

Grenk Shall Smite You

On Friday night, I went to see the movie I Am Legend, staring Will Smith, a dog, and maybe a couple other people. I did rather like the movie, and would recommend it. I bet the book would be a good read.

Talking about books, I started reading Dan Brown's Angels and Demons. We'll see how ambitious I am when it comes to reading. I will either read it rarely or fly through it.

On other exciting news (to some of you), I have created a new Everquest II character that I plan on playing a fair amount. His name is Vython (named after a character in the Lords of Sargoff story I am working on), and he is an Arasai (which is a fancy term for evil fairy). He is pretty cool looking. He is a necromancer, which means he has a pet (currently a giant bat named Grenk) that follows him around and that I can send out to fight for me. I also have lots of spells that do damage. It's pretty sweet.

As I believe I mentioned previously in a blog entry, each year, certain family members and I pick the winners to the college football bowl games. This is a little dorky in itself, yet I have taken in a step farther this year, and have created a web page that can track how we are doing compared with each other as the bowl games are played. I'll post the address to the page in a future entry (the bowl games start in 3 days, so somewhere around then), and then my reading audience can follow along at home (or at least revel in my dorkiness).

LotD: FillerItem. Find an item on Amazon with the exact price you need to qualify for free shipping. How goofy.

An Offer You Can't Refuse

We won the first two games of volleyball last night, including an impressive comeback in game 2. I believe we were down 19-13 (you play to 21 and you have to win by 2), and I think we ended up winning 24-22, or 25-23. It was pretty much wonderful. Sadly, though, we lost the last game (close though, at 21-18), ending the night with a record of 8-1, which is acceptable. That being said, the way I understand it, we'll have another week, then our league will be split in 2 parts, and our records will be reset. Funky.

Ever since I started working at Priority, life seems to have gotten busier, which may be part of the cause of my reduction in blog posts recently. Darn life!

Oddly enough, I had a job interview recently, even though I wasn't looking for a job. A former coworker and good friend of mine recommended me for a position at his company. Even though I enjoy my current job and like the company, I decided to keep my eyes open, in case a better opportunity should arise. That being said, I went into it knowing the chance of a job switch were rather low. I would have had to feel incredibly good about the switch in order to consider it. It would have had to be an excellent opportunity, both occupationally and financially. Basically, in the end, it would have been a good job with interesting work, but I would have taken a major pay cut. Which is not so wonderful. So that, combined with the fact that they thought my experience in some areas was a little light, means I'm staying put at Priority, which is really where I feel I should be at the moment. So it all worked out. :)

Yeah, that's right. I'm a Godfather now. I have been made Godfather of "bnt" - pronounced "bunt" - which stands for "baby number two." [Side note - this is one of those pieces of information that most of the people who read this blog already know, hehe.] This is, of course, the unborn baby currently in sister-in-law Gina's belly, and will probably come bursting out in the somewhat near future. It's pretty neato. As long as horse heads don't start appearing in my bed, and I don't get blamed for a mass murder and get shipped off to a prison guarded by scary floating creatures that can suck your soul out, life should be good.

DotD: Star Trek Urns and Caskets. Just in case your love of Star Trek goes just a bit beyond a hobby.

Life

Darnit, a serious blog entry. No fun. :) This is something I've thought about doing for a little while. These are basically a few truths that define who I am as a person and why I live my life in the manner that I do. Some may seem to contradict each other, but I think they make sense; others may seem to be somewhat similar. But alas, here it is.

1. Life is not that serious. I'm one of those people that can find humor in almost anything. We seem to get worked up about things that don't really matter. Worrying about and getting upset over the little things does nothing to help anything. Pick your fights; and make sure they're worth fighting for. Take a step back and realize what is important and what isn't. And have a good laugh.
2. Life is not a joke. It may be a fine line to tread, but while life is not that serious, it's not a joke either. Do not waste your life on Earthly things. Live your life to the best of your potential, and walk God's path, but do it with a smile on your face.
3. Life is fragile. I am not afraid of death. I try to live my life according to the plan of Christ, and I do not know all that plan holds. Whether my life ends tomorrow or when I'm a hundred years old, I know that my life is fully held within God's hands, and that His purpose will be done.
4. Life is eternal. After we leave this planet, Heaven is waiting, and there we shall live forever. I know that our Earthly deaths are not the end; there is a much greater and more glorious future ahead of us.
5. Life is not unscripted. God is in control of everything. The Bible says each of our days were planned far before we were even thought of by human minds. It is not our place to worry about everything in this life, for God has already figured it all out.
6. Life is imperfect. At least, we humans are imperfect. This leads to imperfect relationships and situations, and to pain and hardships. The fact is that each of us have suffering. While some have it worse than others, we all must fight against it, for through God, any hardships of this world can be overcome. There is nothing that this world can throw at you that, through Jesus, you can't handle.
7. Life is absolute. One of the world's most popular attitudes is "Find your own truth." While we all must find the path that God has made uniquely for us, there is still only One God, One Jesus, and One way to Heaven. You cannot get to Heaven through good works alone, or any other way besides belief in Jesus Christ. It can't be done, and that's the way it is.
8. Life's worth is not measured in years. I would rather die tomorrow but have walked God's path than live a hundred years separated from Christ. We all have the same amount of eternity ahead of us.
9. Life's worth is not measured in dollars. Money and other Earthly things will not get you into Heaven. As the saying goes, "He who dies with the most toys, still dies."
10. Life's worth is not measured by the opinions of others. Do not let others bring you down or tell you that you are less than what you are. The truth is, that you are an amazing creation of an amazing God; nothing less. You are uniquely created to be just the person that God intended.
11. Life's true worth is not measured on this planet. The race we run does not have its finish line on this side of Heaven. When we leave this world and enter the next, then the race will be over.
12. Life's guidebook is the Bible. The Bible is absolute truth; authored by God and simply inked by men.

The Long Road Home

Well, winter has arrived in Minnesota, with two storms over the last few days. Yesterday's storm caused me the most problems, as it took me 2 1/2 hours to drive home (24.7 miles). I moved 3.5 miles during the first hour. Holy cow. I got home, checked my email, had supper, then proceeded to sleep on and off for the next 3 1/2 hours.

This morning should be better, right? Well, yes, but it still took me 1 1/2 hours to get to work. Darn you winter! Oh well I suppose, thus is life.

As I continue to try to improve upon my writing skills, I know I should be reading more as well. I am going to try (depending on how ambitious I am) to start reading Angels and Demons, Dan Brown's book set chronologically before The Da Vinci Code, which I might read as well. But who knows. I have a long list of books on my to-read list. I seem to go through spurts, where I read a lot, then long periods of time when I don't read at all. I read all the Harry Potter books earlier this year, but before that, well, it'd been a while. Oops.

LotD: Uranium Ore, available only on Amazon. Check out the reviews; I found them to be rather humorous. Those people at Amazon must be bored.

Hut, Hut, Hike

Well, weird. The Ohio State Buckeyes rose 4 spots in the rankings by not doing anything, thanks to losses by those ranked above them. They are now slated to play against LSU in the championship game, and this will be a difficult game for the Bucks to win, but they can do it. I really would have rather them played against Missouri, or the team from my parent's current town of residence, West Virginia. But they both slipped in games that could have clinched them a spot in the championship, and I believe they both now fell out of the BCS picture completely.

Now all the bowl games are scheduled, and me and certain family members will probably now pick the winners of each game, as a nifty little competition. Hopefully I can match my performance last year (correctly picking 23 of 32 games) on my road to victory. Either that, or I will do horribly. Ah, we shall see.

All I have to say is...

GO BUCKEYES!

LotD: 0.999 = 1. Didn't you know that?