Man Crush(es)

Wow... I'm really not sure what to say. I'm not sure that you will either.

As if posting a picture of me and my "Malti-Poo", Sadie, on this blog wasn't enough, I'm about to go a step further.

It's a term often tossed around... and I am not afraid to use it: Man Crush.

Urban-Dictionary.com (not officially endorsed by LukeDooley.com) defines a "Man Crush" as follows:

A man having extreme admiration for another man, as though he wants to be him.

All of that to say that I have two, and I am not ashamed to admit it: Justin and John.

Thanks to the internet, and the ingenuity of the later, I can enjoy the tones of both in one beautiful 2 minute 25 second video clip. Enjoy, and thanks to Los for the initial link. BTW... I've watched (listened) to this like 10 times in the past 30 minutes. It would be really cool if my friend Mike would just rip the audio off for me so I could enjoy sans YouTube.




I can just see John listening to the JT album one day in what is sure to be his super trendy loft in NYC, or his Malibu home. When he thinks: "I know! I'll stand in front of the iMac and record myself doing super-human guitar things to the song I love".

How do I know he loves this portion of the song... because I read his blog.

Lovestoned/I Think She Knows (Interlude) - Justin Timberlake - Not so much for the "Lovestoned" part, but for the 45 seconds of ultimate sonic bliss that is "I Think She Knows. It's JT's breakthrough moment as an artist; a novel mix of Coldplay guitar lines, hip hop beats and a vocal approach somewhere in between. When that track comes on I spend the first 3:30 preparing for the awesomeness to come. Then I yell at the speakers, "Make this 4 minutes long and put it on the next disc!"

Failure? I think not

Some may say that setting a goal to blog for 7 straight days and then missing 3 straight days after only blogging for 2 straight days would qualify as "failure". I say that it would only be failure if I gave up, and didn't jump back on the horse.

Truth is, the weekends are always crazy. This weekend was especially crazy. Family gatherings, parents left for Florida for 3 months, all day planning meeting on Saturday, church on Sunday, etc... etc...

Today is my day off. I've been completely lazy. This picture with me un-showered, on my couch, watching football with my dog pretty much sums up my activities.

I do have some random thoughts and confessions to share.

- The Golden Globe ceremony last night was extremely lame. Jen and I watched a few minutes of it. It was painful.

- I think Rob & Big is one of the funniest shows I've ever seen. Maybe it's because they are so juvenile. I simply think those guys are hilarious together. Last night we watched an episode about a mysterious "pooper" leaving a present in their swimming pool. I laughed a lot.

- I'm glad that Eli and the Giants beat the Cowboys. Eli takes a lot of heat for not being as good as Peyton. Yesterday went a long way towards hushing a lot of that talk. That drive by the Giants at the end of the 1st half was sweet.

- How did the Colts lose that game? That was lame on their part. How do you throw the ball deep on 2nd and 3rd down when you only need 7 yards?

- Macworld begins tomorrow. It almost feels like a holiday. My lunch break will be spent in front of my computer screen watching people who are even geekier than I am blogging every move, word, gesture, and announcement that Steve makes. I might wear jeans and a black mock turtleneck tomorrow just for fun.

New number... so traumatic

In an effort to continue the 7 straight days of blogging (something... anything... just blog)... I'm back with Day 2.


Have you ever switched cell phone numbers? It's quite stressful isn't it? I recently made the switch to the world's greatest mobile device ... at first it wasn't a big deal because I was carrying both phones, so people could reach me on either number. It was actually kind of nice because certain people didn't have the new number... I could hide from them (I know shocking... pastors hide from people... you should see what I can do with the new invisible feature of iChat).

So, today we made the decision to end the contract we had with our old provider and go exclusively with AT&T. I'm very excited I no longer have to carry two phones... that was annoying.

Anyway, it's just stressful to change numbers. I hate it... I've had my old cell phone number since my freshman year of college at the CHOG's finest institution of higher learning . So many people had that number... people from Florida, Ohio, Camps, Church, School, Family, Friends, Colleagues, World Leaders... the list goes on.

Now I must face the realization that at this very moment someone may be dialing 513.594.0667 and hearing a computerized person on the other end telling them that I have officially changed my number without giving them adequate notice. I could be offending someone right now. I can't handle that pressure. Hopefully my e-mails, facebook announcements and text messages to my contacts are adequate means of spreading the message of my new cell phone number.

If only I (we) was so adamant about spreading the Gospel of Jesus as I was my new cell phone number. Now that would be something....

Musical Confessions of Music Junky

I like music. Really, I love music. I'm shocked that God didn't bless me with some sort of ability... I think that was clearly a joke he played on me: "This will be great... this guy is going to love music, but embarrass himself when he tries to sing in public, or play the drums on Rockband".

All of that said, I have some musical confessions I'd like to make. You see, I pride myself on being a fan of "Good Music" (I know... novel idea). So, admitting that I am a fan of anything that is too "poppy" is kind of pain-staking for me.

However, I have come across a couple of songs/artists that I am really enjoying, and they definitely fall into the "pop" category.

1.) Dreaming Out Loud: OneRepublic - These guys came out of nowhere with their mega-hit "Apologize". Don't be fooled, this would not have happened if they did not have the one and only Timbaland on board with the remix of that track. I've liked that song since the day I heard it on the radio... to say it is not infectious is to speak a lie. However, today I was doing a little musical recon and decided to pull down their entire album. I listened all the way through, and while there are couple boredom tracks that are over produced, I really enjoyed it for the most part. The song titled: "Mercy" is awesome... we'll be doing that at Journey Church in the near future I'm sure.

2.) As I Am: Alicia Keys - Now this is borderline pop. You see, she is actually an incredibly talented artist who writes, plays and sings her own music. I have a hard time calling her pop... although she would typically be defined as such. With her, it's not so much the whole album as it is the song: "No One". I'm addicted to it! I turn it up loud, and pump my fist... it's an anthem! There are some other solid songs on the album too, including: "The Thing About Love", "Wreckless Love", and "Lessons Learned" (featuring John Mayer). If you don't believe me, just read what John Mayer had to say about her (and the album) on a recent blog post:

I've been busy in the studio, both with my own music and working with Alicia. We wrote a song called "Lesson Learned" and it was one of the best creative experiences I've ever had. Oh, and her lead-off single "No One" is the track of the year. That's all there is to it. It'll blow you away when you hear it. She's evolved so much as an artist, it's crazy. She's made one beautiful and BRAVE album. Okay! Okay. That's enough slobbering over Alicia. She really is that good tho-OKAY

Blog O' Rama

I must begin blogging on a regular basis. I refuse to call it a New Year's Resolution... those never end well for me.

So, in an effort to create some rhythm, I am planning to blog for the next 7 days... every day. I know, why start on a Wednesday... honestly, because I just had the idea. Leave me alone and enjoy the randomness of the next 7 days. These blogs will have no rhyme or reason, they will simply be my thoughts. As will be evidenced by what I post in a few moments.

Luke

The Tipping Point...

Do people really read stories such as this and think: "Wow... that is intelligent. I can totally see how that is true."

Maybe they do... maybe I'm just a weird church kid who thinks it sounds insane to talk about how "Evolution tinkered" with the design of a woman's back so she doesn't "Tip Over" while pregnant.

Yea... Evolution.... that's it.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,316599,00.html

Sad Day

Is it stupid that this brings tears to my eyes?

What a cool/good guy.

Click Here for complete coverage.

The Internet is dead

This might be the funniest video on the internet.


Breaking News: All Online Data Lost After Internet Crash

Confessions of a Pastor

I have a confession to make...

It's 11:55 pm, and I just spent about 15 minutes playing with a website. Not just any website though. This is perhaps the coolest website ever created.

Follow these Directions:

1.) Click here

2.) Customize your ride

3.) Invite some friends

4.) Waste as much time as you can possibly afford to

5.) Follow some of the links to check out one of the coolest churches in America, and/or purchase me a registration to the Drive 08 conference :)

6.) Rinse / Repeat!

Mute Math.... Just watch (twice)

Okay, I'm going to try to explain this. The first video I am going to show you is of an amazing band named Mute Math performing a song on the Jimmy Kimmel Show. The only catch is that they didn't play the song live, they played a track, and all they did was "act out" their motions, instruments, and vocals. In itself, that sounds a lot like lip-synching... except when you realize they did it all backwards... IN ONE TAKE!

So, that is the first video... it is essentially "live", in the sense that it's what the audience, and people at the Jimmy Kimmel Show witnessed.

The second video is what aired on TV. Everything is perfect, the guitar riffs, the drum beats, the vocals, everything looks as though they are playing it forward. They are not...

This band is amazing, and I think I just officially decided that I will be going to see them October 14th at Bogart's. You should probably go too....

AirTap!

This guy played at the WillowCreek Leadership Summit. It's pretty ridiculous, so I thought I would share it with you. Enjoy! (YouTube video embedded for you RSS readers).

Leading at the Highest Level

They just played a taped interview of Colin Powell at the Summit. He is a fascinating person, and a great leader. I'm going to refer you to Dave Ferguson's Blog for this one. He had a sneak peek at the video and has written up a great review!

Click Here to read all about it!

Marcus Buckingham (Handsome Englishman)

For me the highlight of Day 1 from the Leadership Summit was the final presentation which was given by a "chap" named Marcus Buckingham. This guy is sharp! He was funny, he was quick, he was intelligent, he was a great communicator.... basically, he was Hugh Grant with a great knowledge of strengths based teachings. All that said... here are some highlights from his talk entitled: Put Your Strengths To Work!

Some Quotes:

"The opposite of bad is not good... it’s simply not bad."

“You can only learn about excellence from studying excellence as opposed to studying failure to learn about excellence. Likewise we should study our strengths to become better people, not our weaknesses.”

“Your strengths are not the things you are strong at.... Your strengths are the things that make you feel strong!”

Some Teaching Points:

Three Myths & Three Truths

Myth #1: As you grow your personality changes
Truth #1 : As you grow you become more of who you already are

Myth #2 : You grow the most in your areas of greatest weakness.
Truth #2 : You grow the most in your areas of greatest strength.

Myth #3 : A great team member puts his strengths aside and does whatever it takes to help the team.
Truth #3 : A great team member volunteers his strengths to the team most of the time.

Leadership Summit 1

Tom and I will be hanging out down at Vineyard Community Church for the next couple of days for the Willow Creek Leadership Summit. Technology is an amazing thing.... In Chicago there are thousands of people gathered with some of the foremost experts on Leadership. Thanks to people much smarter than me, there are also 65,000 people gathered in churches all around the country experiencing the same worship, and teaching. Very cool!

Bill Hybels just shared in the first session... lots of things that I could share, I'm just going to give you a few of my top quotes from his session entitled: Vision To Die For!

“When you are faced with adversity in the midst of carrying out your vision, it requires a gut check on how important your vision is for your organization.”

“Great leaders spend more time trying to figure out how to create a deeper level of ownership of the vision than how to better write and communicate the vision.”

“The single most determining factor as to whether or not your followers will own the vision is the extent to which they sense YOU own the vision”

Music Notes

So, apparently the music theme of this blog will continue. A few notes for you loyal readers below... Enjoy!

1.) I wanted to be able to share the rest of the photos from the John/Ben concert (see below), so I ventured a little further into "Web 2.0" and created a Flickr account. I can't believe I never had an account before... very cool service, and super easy to upload and create albums. Anyway, you can "Click Here" to view all of the pics from the concert.

2.) The national love continues for Jon McLaughlin. Jon was featured on the Today show this morning as a part of their summer concert series. You can go to the shows website to find video of Jon playing his hit song "Beautiful Disaster". Click here to go the page and then click on the picture/link to the left.

3.) I also recently found out that Mr. McLaughlin will be dropping by Cincinnati for a show this summer. Jon will be playing July 22nd at the 20th Century Theatre for the price of only $10. Click here for more info. I'll be there... will you?

4.) More to come on this guy later, but I wanted to give you a little teaser for my boy Chris Carpenter. Follow these links for more on this friend and rockstar (whom I happened to run into at the John Mayer concert by the way).
http://www.chriscarpentermusic.com/
http://www.myspace.com/chriscarpenter

Concert... Awesome

I love going to concerts. I spent the better part of my college years (and savings account) going to concerts. I have yet to outgrow the itch to watch a great band live. It's really hard to top John Mayer when it comes to a modern day concert. Tonight I had the opportunity to see John Mayer for the 5th time... I can say without reservation that he gets better every time I see him. He has matured as an artist, a performer, and a guitar player. It's amazing to watch him play... it appears so effortless and fluid... he's really amazing at his craft. It was also an extra bonus tonight that Ben Folds happened to be the opening act for John on this leg of his tour. Ben requires a sense of humor and sometimes a thick skin to appreciate... I apparently have both :)

Thought I'd share some pictures with you all. Jen and I had great seats (5th row, Floor)... I wish we had a better camera, we could have captured some great photos... I did what I could with our little Canon Powershot. Oh, and the guitar pick is real... I didn't catch it, but I watched John throw it and apparently was the only one paying attention. No one picked it up, so I grabbed the spoils as soon as the show was over. Enjoy the pics....

Day 1 at CAMP!

Believe it or not this post is coming straight from my bunk in the "Lebanon" cabin at Camp Lebanon Retreat Center (picture intended as proof). I'm amazed that a little Linksys router can send me a signal across the lake... but it's happening.... we live in a strange world!

Really excited to be here at camp this week. It's tough being away from Jenessa, home, office, life, etc.... but it's also really nice to be out here in a place that I love spending time with 110 high school students. I love these kids... I see them once a year and it's like I'm their best friend... nothing like the first day of camp and all the hugs and hand pounds ("daps" for all you hip readers) that are given out. I look forward to this every year, and it never gets old!

I am definitely getting my share of quality (really high quality) worship between Young Adult Camp and this Senior High Camp. Mike Gaines and his band absolutely rocked out last weekend at YAC... Mike is so gifted, I am excited to have him on my ministry team! This week we have the pleasure of having 2 of the brightest young worship leaders in Southwest Ohio co-leading the worship band. Aaron Barnes and Travis Flynn flat out brought it tonight at the kickoff service. They played 8 or 9 songs total... it was invigorating to watch the students worship God. Can't wait to see how God moves in the next 4 days! I'll do my best to keep you all posted.

HOT ROD!

I'm not sure why, but this blog has taken on quite the music & movies theme the past couple of weeks. I assure this is not, nor will ever be an entertainment blog.

That said, it's safe to say that I'll be looking forward to this movie all summer.

Go here for a much longer trailer... this movie will be a classic.

Sneak Peek Post

Last night I had the opportunity to check out the new movie Evan Almighty down at the AMC on the Levee. The movie doesn't open until June 22nd, but Journey Church's media guru hooked us up with some sneak peek passes.

To tell you the truth I was little worried about the movie going in. You see, all of the church people have been hyping this movie. Study guides, small group materials, and web-sites rallying the cause of this family friendly Bible promoting movie. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for family friendly, appropriate humor, and I'm definitely for anything that puts God's story into mainstream culture. It's just that typically when a bunch of Christians rally behind something, there's a good chance it's really cheesy, and will only serve to further alienate disconnected people from the local church.

With all of that said. I was pleasantly surprised. The movie was hilarious! (Can Steve Carell be in anything that's not funny?) Wanda Sykes nearly stole the show... she is so funny. It was not cheesy, or corny, in fact it was quite revealing, and carried much truth in the midst of all the humor. In fact, there was one scene where God is talking to Evan's wife (Joan... Joan of Ark) about prayer, and how God answers prayers. He said:

"If you pray for courage, do you think I'm going to give you courage, or the opportunity to be courageous... If you pray for your family to become closer, do you think I'm going to give you warm fuzzy feelings about one another, or give you the opportunity to grow closer as a family".

Quite a different perspective on prayer. What are some of the things that you are praying for that you are waiting for God to simply bestow upon you, when in reality he is giving you the opportunity to act, do, or be what you are praying for. Maybe we should start seeing opportunities as answers to prayers.

All in all, it was a good movie. I highly recommend it to you. Great for the family, great for kids, great for adults. Go see it. Oh, and just for the record, I would probably give it 4 SchruteBucks!

The Jetsons era has arrived

"In the future packages will be sent to distant lands through beams of light." (If you know where that quote comes from, I'll give you a prize).

I simply cannot believe the world we live in. Everyday I am amazed, and I take for granted the wonder of the technology around me. It is absolutely stunning to think about how it has changed our lives.

When I see things like this... I am amazed. My jaw drops, and I think: "Oh my gosh, what all am I going to see in my lifetime." And then I think: "Wow, Apple is going to take this and make it like 20 times cooler and easier to use".

Go here, watch the three videos (less than 1 minute each), and be amazed.