A pledge and a promise

Believe or not, to my knowledge, I have never had cottage cheese.  When I was a kid, it frightened me, looked weird, and kind of smelled bad.  Also, I decided early in my 20’s (ahh, so long ago) that I would save my first cottage cheese for marriage.  I am quite proud of my culinary virginity.  Sometimes, I would get tempted when I was at a buffet or even grocery shopping.  I thought, I have tried so many weird foods and various treats within the same family as cottage cheese, what is the big deal.  But i stayed true, and have yet to give away my cottage cheese purity.  :)

Now inevitably some of you will assume that this is all innuendo (shhh, of the sexual nature).  Some of you know me well enough to know that I am random and odd and therefore think this is real.  So before I go on with my story, I will tell you thetruth.  It is both!!! Yes, I am a cottage cheese virgin and have told this to many of my friends!!! but yes you can also replace cottage cheese with….eh hem….sex.  So enjoy this post like you drank a jib of cough syrup and are watching House.  Figure out what it means for you!

Now, I was sharing this story with my married friends last week.  They laughed at the thought of a person actually committing to not eat a relatively mundane food until their honey moon.  But in the midst of the humor, the wife (and for this part, please stop the innuendo or else I am a bad human), to my horror, told me something. She baked christmas cookies for me (again no innuendo, actual cookies, actual holiday) and they had cottage cheese in them!!! (okay resume sexual innuendo).

I cupped my head in my hands as I realized that I am now no longer pure, when it comes to cottage cheese.  So what I am I asked my friends.  Am I a “secondary” cottage cheese virgin? well, I don’t know.  Does eating cooked cottage cheese in the form of a tasty cookie count as an oath breaking event?  If it does, then well, I guess last christmas, I started my new life as a “secondary” cottage cheese virgin.  I hope my future wife understands.  Personally I don’t think this one fits.

Am I a “technical” cottage cheese virgin?  I mean did I enjoy as much cottage cheese as I could without “technically” eating it?  Wow, this is a tough world of culinary purity.  How will I tell my children when we are talking about cottage cheese?  How will my wife respond?

Bottom line, it is just cottage cheese!  Seriously, why do we do this to ourselves.  Now don’t get me wrong, I think everyone should save at least one dairy derivative delight for dedication to matrimony.  But you know what, I am 28.  I am a human being.  I like food!  I was built with a strong desire to try food and to enjoy it.  Maybe you need to read this and be free of your guilt!!!!

Be redeemed!  Be human!  Try to stay away from the cottage cheese for just a little bit longer.  Some times I can only face one day at a time.  I tell myself I don’t know how I will keep the spoon out of the plastic Dannon tub for years until that wonderful day, but I know that I can do it today!! And sometimes that is how I approach it.

Don’t think that if you are lactose intolerant, and therefore able to easily avoid cottage cheese you are better then anybody else.  I actually feel bad for you.  Cause you know you want it!  but you have such a weak stomach you can’t enjoy the thought of it.  It frightens you and makes you feel bad about yourself.  I am here to tell you that the older I get, the more I want to try it, and you know what that is quite okay and natural!!

Now maybe, some of you hate cottage cheese cause you were forced to eat it as a child.  I can totally understand why you would be opposed to it.  Just remember something, trying it out, enjoying it, desiring it, will never justify what some person did by forcing you to eat it when you were younger.  Let God, as He promises to do in Luke, take revenge, don’t punish yourself.  You deserve to enjoy cottage cheese more then anyone!!  (and on a personal note, I can write this paragraph because in my story, for a brief moment, I was that child )

Please help me make it one more day in my quest to save cottage cheese for marriage.  Don’t be buying it for me or putting it on my plate at parties!!!!  Finally, I am trying not to spend all day online looking at various ways that it can be made and served.

If you are going to the store….

I am all out of peanut butter. I still have honey but I need peanut butter for the sandwich. Crunchy please. Generic is fine.

Thanks!
dave

Guys Holiday

Before I begin.  I would like to recognize a few people.  I want to thank Mickey who I love dearly for his kind comments.  I also want to thank my co-worker Kat (not sure if it is “K” or “C” for reading my blog and encouraging me).

 

I have recently been reading a book called “More then Serving Tea.”  Today I knocked out about 50 pages of it.  It was given to me by a very dear person.  

The book is about the struggles for Asian-American Women who are Christians.  Strange because I am only two of those (American-Christian, just if you know you weren’t sure).  I will reserve my intimate feelings and responses to the book for the person that gave it to me.  Some things are just to personal for a public blog…go figure.

But it has caused me to take stock of what it means to be a male in society.  And I realized that when it came to many areas, especially holidays, I am a spoiled little bitch.  :)  All my life, every holiday, in every family gathering…the women have done the work.  I haven’t done s#*%!  My grandmother, who sadly passed in April, cooked on my dad’s side while we watched football.  My mom has always prepared delicious feasts for us.  Side note-she makes her own barbeque sauce which is soooooo amazing!  

Every holiday every year! for 28 years!!  Lets add that up. Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, July 4, New Years Eve (I don’t count birthdays cause well, you know, you shouldn’t have to lift a finger on your own damn birthday!! to quote Paul Blart..”everybody deserves a card on their birthday.”  5 x 28 is 140 holidays.  Now minus the first 6 or so years when I couldn’t really help because I was still suckling upon my mom’s bosom (It is the official position of my blog that we support breastfeeding, its just better for the baby, sorry I know it hurts sometimes).  Thats minus 30.  We are officially at 110 holidays where men watched football, wrestled around, and acted like general idiots while the women worked.  

Now most of you know me, I tend to be too hard on myself, and though I am making a point here, I must say that some guys did help.  My grandpa on my dad’s side helped out by making the mashed potatoes..something even i can do.  And my mom’s husband Leon is actually a really good cook and helps out.  I will assign an arbitrary score to each of their labor at lets say 14 holidays.   So 110 minus 14 equals….96.  I am 96 meals in the hole because I believe whole heartedly in gender equality and serving others.  

So for the next 96 holidays until I erase my debt…I will be serving you Mac and Cheese with Tuna mixed in.  The only edible dish I know how to make. (I am not kidding).  Well, I am kidding about the 96 holidays but not about my ineptness as a master chef.

I can never fully understand how much my mom and grandmothers and aunts have loved me in the way they have prepared holidays.  So I present a new idea, that I will institute on the off-chance I make it to the altar and have kids and what not.  ”Guys Holiday” seriously it is about time we as guys get in on the fun.  So we split up holidays like a step-son and his girlfriend do.  One  holiday for this side of the family and another holiday for that side.  On “Guys Holidays” the guys cook, clean, serve, and smile all while the girls sit in the living room and watch, talk, do, whatever it is girls do together (I wouldn’t know).  

I would take pride in guys holiday.  I would be pissed if my sister-in-law or make-believe wife or mom even so much as whipped the potatoes.  You would hear guys in the kitchen of course we would be cussing each other out over the boullion (not sure how to spell “boulion” or even what it is) and the turkey, but we would get it done!!

The only good in me.

The only good in me comes directly from Jesus Christ.  Apart from Him I am nothing.  With Him, I have everything I need.  

Please read this passage below:

• 16.

 

• Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was being provoked within him as he was observing the city full of idols.

• 17.

 

• So he was reasoning in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles, and in the market place every day with those who happened to be present.

• 18.

 

• And also some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers were conversing with him. Some were saying, “What would this idlebabbler wish to say ?” Others , “He seems to be a proclaimer of strange deities,”-because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection.

• 19.

 

• And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching is which you are proclaiming ?

• 20.

 

• “For you are bringing some strange things to our ears ; so we want to know what these things mean .”

• 21.

 

• (Now all the Athenians and the strangers visiting there used to spend their time in nothing other than telling or hearingsomething new.)

• Sermon on Mars Hill

• 22.

 

• So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects.

• 23.

 

• “For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, ‘TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.’ Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you.

• 24.

 

• “The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands ;

• 25.

 

• nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and allthings ;

• 26.

 

• and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointedtimes and the boundaries of their habitation,

• 27.

 

• that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;

• 28.

 

• for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His children.’

• 29.

 

• “Being then the children of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and thought of man.

• 30.

 

• “Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent,

• 31.

 

• because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.”

• 32.

 

• Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some began to sneer, but others said, “We shall hear you againconcerning this.”

• 33.

 

• So Paul went out of their midst.

• 34.

 

• But some men joined him and believed, among whom also were Dionysius the Areopagite and a woman named Damaris and others with them.
• I will follow Chirst with my live because He conquered death.  A feat yet to be matched in all of history.  

Hope in Death

The door was unlocked.  I let myself in.  There was panic in her voice.  ”Please come in.”  I saw her.  She was dripping with sweat.  She continued her work. Death stood over her shoulder.  I asked her if she needed relief.  It was an unnecessary question.  She was poring out love through her hands.  I took her place.  I began my work.  Once you start, you must not stop.  I have experienced enough time with death to know that it was present.  I have always been sensitive to deeply spiritual experiences, such as death.  I do not like death.  As I worked, I maintained a measure of hope.  Eventually I was relieved by someone better, stronger.  As I remained at the entrance to death’s door.  I watched men work.  and work.  Life returned, if only for a moment.

O Death Where Is Thy Sting!

Don’t waste the good surprise.

I base as much of my life principles on Adam Sandler movies as anything else.  I learned after 50 first dates that not only is it good to date an amnesiac it also the most ideal situation.  I love that movie.  Buried in, Big Daddy (a movie chock full of wisdom about life and child-rearing), is a little gem to live by.  Sandler’s roommate is having a birthday.  The girlfriend is throwing a surprise party.  Well, Sandler walks in uninvited and unexpected.  Everyone says, Happy Birthday!, or suprise! or whatever you get the point.  The girlfriend is angry and having a little argument with him when the boyfriend walks to no ones cheers.  The girlfriend states: “we wasted the good surprise on you!”  

Let that sink in before moving on…..okay move on now.

 

As I mulled my last 6 plus years since I graduated college, I have let one relationship dictate my life and every other subsequent relationship.  I felt like I wasted the good surprise on her.  and then what I gave in the following relationships was what I would call mediocre, unacceptable, and basically a sad version of me.  And I never wanted to take responsibility.  I always blamed that situation.  Until one day I was sitting with my pastor, lamenting a story I have told too many times when he stopped me, he called me out on the fact that I did not want to take responsibility for where I was at.

I wanted to keep thinking I had wasted the good Dave on her.  So I got to work, and am continuing to work.  I am working on the areas that I need to improve on to be a better man (and the Lord has been graciously working in my life).  I began studying what exactly I want in a relationship and what I don’t want.  It has helped me tremendously.  The work part is hard, but it is returning the “surprise” back to me.  I didn’t waste the good surprise!  I still have it and it is me.  Somewhere out there may be a girl waiting to share her good surprise with me.

Growing Older

Well, I recently had a birthday.  I have made a few observations about life that I would like to share.

1.  If I had to choose a t.v. mom, it would definitely be Susan Sarandon.

2.  I like sleeves.  One of my favorite coworkers in his mid-thirties.  We bought a couple of t-shirts honoring a fallen coworker who died in Iraq.  My buddy said wow that is a great work out shirt, just cut the sleeves off, and it will be good to go.  I probably will never understand or join the sleeveless movement.

3.  I like getting older.  I don’t really want to be any other age then what i am now.  

4.  I like yogurt.  Should got into this stuff a long time ago.

5.  Living alone in my own apartment, is not so bad.  In fact it has its benefits.

 

I hope that everyone out there in the blog world has a great birthday this year!

Join the club.

 

I woke up late today.  Fortunately, my motorcycle was up and ready to go.  I think I averaged about 86 m.p.h. for the 115 miles from San Diego to L.A in heavy traffic.  I flew from L.A. to San Francisco where I had a two hour layover.  Then I flew to Pheonix where I had another one and a half hour layover.  Then from Pheonix I flew to Columbus.  Tomorrow I drive to Cleveland for my grandmother’s funeral.  I am exhausted and out of my routine.  On the flight from Pheonix to Columbus, I sat next to a nice mother and daughter.  The daughter’s boyfriend and I went to graduate school together.  Small world.  The girl though said he was probably a dork in grad school like he is now.  Then she said she still loves him though.  I don’t know why people put down there significant others, especially to other people.  I think it is a bad sign.  The older get, the more I want to treat people I love better.  I want to be kind and encouraging.  There is a song I like called “Voices” by the band Saosin.  The songs states that we speak in different voices when arguing with the ones we love.  This should not be.  Shoot the airline that I flew (I would state the name, but you gotta pay me!), had a special club for frequent flyers, like a gold club or something.  I was thinking, I ought to have my own club for frequent Dave-flyers.  If you log a certain number of hours with me whether as my friend, coworker, relative, or significant other, you deserve something.  You deserve to be treated special, to be recognized, and to be made a priority above the other casual, non-loyal flyers. 

 

Do you reward or punish those that fly with you frequently?  Through the storms, the cancellations, and the price that it costs? 

 

To often we do use a different voice with those we love, only its not the voice of privilege, but rather of disdain.  And if that toddler doesn’t quiet down two seats behind me, I am going to start crying.  J

Bullet Points

1.  I like working.

2.  I miss my tuesday night support group from Ohio.  I love you all, and miss you all!

3.  My sinuses suck.

4.  I like to stand in line at the California D.M.V………  But then I get my little ticket with the Bingo number on it.  Then I go to the back of the line and sell it to the highest bidder (usually $30 does it.)  Then go buy lunch.  Then repeat….

5.  I like to go to the grocery store and wait in the express 12 items or less line.  I like to count everyone’s items in front of me.  I like to verbally berate them for having 13 or 14 items instead of 12.  Go buy lunch…then repeat.

6.  I like Romans 5:8, I like praying through this passage as my church discusses Easter and our outreach.

7.  I like to run in the canyon.

8.  I am back to painting.

9.  I like to sleep….go buy lunch….then repeat.

One More Step

Well, My journey back to normalcy is well on its way.  I still have many more steps in that journey, but I took a big one over the last week.  I am pushing out a fair amount of anxiety, but Jesus has been awesome.   He has made my transition very smooth so far.  I hope to repay His faithfulness with a lifetime of worship.  

 

Never Give Up!  

Phil. 4:13