You never want to be That Guy in the office. You know the one I’m talking about. If you don’t, then it might actually be you. Here’s a checklist you can use to find out if you are, in fact, That Guy:

1. You call everyone by nicknames that you made up. You might use part of their name like Billy Boy or Big Mike, or you may just use the unilateral Brosef, Shooter or Cletus for all of your co-workers.

2. You’re more likely to be found loitering outside someone else’s office than in your own designated cubicle. If you conduct more business away from your desk than at it, write a short message on your white board concerning your whereabouts as a courtesy to others, or we WILL tie a bell around your neck.

3. You insist on having long, drawn out phone conversations when everybody else on the cube farm is working quietly. While you may think you are using your inside voice, let me assure you that you’re not. And if I really wanted to enjoy a boring one-sided discussion in which I have no input, I’ll just spend more time with my wife. (Of course this is completely false, but I thought it might get a reaction out of people, and it sounded really funny in my head. This blog could be so much funnier if my wife actually had a couple character flaws and didn’t read what I wrote.)

3b. You have all the previously mentioned conversations, or worse, conference calls on speaker phone. We have magical places called phone rooms and conference rooms. Feel free to check them out.

4. You are constantly complaining. If you are doing this in a sarcastic, cynical or otherwise funny way, please continue. If you’re just being annoying and a joy kill, knock it off.

5. You find it necessary to let out a high pitched WHOOP or other deafening noise as soon as you make eye contact with anyone in the office, regardless of how far away you might be. This causes extremely uncomfortable situations when you are hundreds of feet apart and walking toward each other down a narrow hallway. Keep your head down and your mouth shut until you are no more than twenty feet apart. At this point a simple head nod, “How ya doin’?” or shot with the “finger gun” is acceptable and appropriate.

If you realized you have made one of these fatal work place mistakes, don’t panic. Most people throw around forgiveness like empty promises, but if you are a serial offender, this is wake up call. You need to take a hard look in the mirror, and start with him, because I’m askin’ him to change his ways. No message could be any clearer. If you want to make your office a better place, take a look at yourself, and then make a change. nah nah nah… nah nah nah… whoo!…

Do you know That Guy?

Saturday morning I woke up in a panic. I rarely remember dreaming, and obviously recall the specifics of what I dreamt even more infrequently, but Saturday when I awoke, I immediately knew I had been having a nightmare. Unfortunately I couldn’t even begin to guess at the vivid circumstances that had been playing through my comatose mind just moments earlier. I chalked it up to another irretrievable nocturnal illusion and began getting dressed.

Within five minutes, the dream sequence was rushing back to my consciousness. But it wasn’t just a dream; it was based in truth. I had been terribly busy at work on Friday. Then I left early and NASCARed my trusty Mazda to my wife’s new school and spent several hours helping her set up her classroom. We ran errands to several stores, and got home late, immediately eating dinner then being drawn into a late starting Rangers game in which they blew up the Athletics nine to one. I went to bed anticipating breakfast in the morning with my boys from home group and was completely blind sided by horrific but not completely untrue hallucinations… I forgot my Friday blog post!

In my dream I was frantically searching for a topic to discuss, a clever joke to make, some witty witticism for my readers to witness, but none could be found. Then like a flood light burning through the fog, a scripture from the book of Acts hit me like a freight train, and I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this week Theological Thursday must be followed by Faith Filled Friday. Then I woke up.

But I really did forget to post. I could have written a Johnny-come-lately post on Saturday, but as I’ve mentioned before, I’m not afraid to leave a man behind, so I just abandoned ship and enjoyed the weekend.

Fast forward to Sunday, and my wife and I are driving home after a post-church lunch with one of my former co-workers. Our pastor had really brought it that morning in his sermon, emphasizing that Creation, the Gospel and God’s saving grace is not about us. Everything exists to reveal the glory of God. It’s all about Him! Then we had a great meal full of tacos and queso accompanied by great conversation, but on the drive home it hit me, I didn’t check in on Foursquare at lunch. I was stunned.

Twice in three days, reality had caused me to neglect my virtual responsibilities. Well never again! I vow to pay less attention to my family and friends, focusing more time on interweb strangers. I promise to redouble my efforts at venues where I possess Foursquare mayorships, and I will never again miss a “Good morning.”, “It’s lunch time.”, “Good night.” or “My dog just eliminated waste.” status update to Facebook or Twitter again.

Are you ever distracted by reality?

I’ve been flying a lot recently. We have a project in Houston, and in case I haven’t mentioned it recently, Houston’s the worst.

Anyway… I think your prayer life can go a long way in revealing the state of your heart. This became apparent to me when, for the second Thursday in a row, I was flying back to Dallas on a blue sky day with inexplicable turbulence forcing the plane up and down and side to side. My palms got sweaty and beads of moisture began forming on my forehead and upper lip. I was perspiring more than I had been three hours earlier while climbing around the roof of an elementary school in Houston’s humidiful hundred degree blast furnace, and I found myself praying for safety, smooth skies and steady hands for the pilots.

Less than an hour later, as we touched down, I was whispering words of thanks and praise, and then it hit me. What if these instinctual prayers could be flip flopped? What if I didn’t just pray in earnest when faced with situations wholly outside of “my control?” What if I spent more of my time on the ground petitioning and persistently begging God for more faith, wisdom and love for Him and other people? And then what if in crisis I could thank Him for the abundance of blessings in my life, for the countless opportunities He’s provided and worship Him for His perfect truth and infinite grace?

What if we could have a right understanding of our significance in life and Christ’s complete power over and defeat of death?

What do your prayers say about you?

If you’ve been looking for more great ways to be even greener, and you already drive a Prius, carpool, use those spiral looking light bulbs, recycle everything, have a composte pile and purchase carbon credits, this may be just the thing for you. Please consider using your bath towel multiple times before washing it. Hotels are already beginning to encourage patrons to do just this. Many chains request that you use your towel at least twice, but if it needs laundered, just leave it on the floor.

Now this is an absolutely necessary and critical component to this incredibly environmentally friendly energy conservation measure: Always, and I mean always, keep track of which side of the towel you use for your face and which side you use for your nether regions. Obviously your towel only touches your body when its the cleanest, but even so, its just kinda gross to think about what might happen if you’re not paying attention. Feel free to use my patent pending solution: Tag side of the towel for face and body, opposite side for the unmentionables.

So to sum up: 1. Save money. 2. Save the planet. 3. Avoid cross contamination.

Do you use your towel more than once?

With an incredibly limited number of channels and an even more limited amount of quality content, I was tricked (for the second time in two weeks) into watching Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps. To say I was tricked may be overstating. I suppose I was technically cornered into viewing this fairly interesting and entertaining movie. The down side is that last night and the previous Monday evening have been spent in away from home in a slightly above average Houston area Drury Inn and Suites. Given their complimentary breakfast and happy hour, as well as their small but sufficient workout facility, clean rooms and plush towels, their television channel dificiency and lack of HD programming is an obvious but subtle black eye that I’m willing to overlook.

The point is, last Monday Home Box Office saw fit to air Wall Street just as I was turning in for the evening, around eleven P.M. I hadn’t yet seen the movie, but wanted to, and ended up watching it in it’s entirety ’til about one A.M. That was a mistake, and I was dragging big time and kicking myself all day Tuesday for my poor judgement and stupidity. Regardless, the movie was decent and I enjoyed it. Fast forward to last night, and I was trapped again! But this time I had a secret weapon… will power and the remote control power button. I also had back up in the form of complete and utter exhaustion.

So I still watched half of it… turns out I don’t really have much will power, but I do have an abundance of stupidity and the ability to learn very little from prevoius mistakes, so I’ve got that going for me.

Have you ever been backed into a TV viewing corner, either by dismal selection or someone holding the remote hostage?

What were you forced to watch? Did you end up liking it?

There are three ways to respond when the stock market falls through the floor like it has this past week:

1. Get depressed. I mean really depressed. I’m talking Ben and Jerry’s, Haagen-Dazs, cookie dough, brownie batter, milk and Oreos sitting on the couch in your underwear without showering for two weeks with a cherry on top depressed.

2. Carpe Diem. Yeah, I went there. Seize the day! Bungee jumpin’, cliff divin’, brussel sprout tryin’, buyin’ low and sellin’ high. Gordon Gekko eat your heart out.

3. What the heck is the stock market? Do you want fries with that?

Bonus:

4. Trust God. Focus on what is eternal, unchanging and true. Allow the stress and volatility of this broken and sinful world to draw you into relationship with Jesus Christ. Run toward His open arms rather than away from them.

How do you respond to the market?

My wife has been getting pretty good at using Windows Movie Maker. She put some of our pictures from our recent trip to Alaska to music, and it turned out pretty great!

Hope you all enjoy.

I recently read an article like this one discussing Phantom Vibration Syndrome. Just because you haven’t heard of it doesn’t mean you haven’t experienced it. This is an epidemic that is plaguing First World Countries. Phantom Vibration Syndrome is when you are properly using the vibrate function on your cellular device. You feel the “alert”, and pull your phone from your purse, pocket or totally awesome and non-nerdy belt holster, only to find that your phone is not ringing. You have not missed a call or received a text or email or notification that your favorite sports team has begun a game, been rain delayed, scored a run or won or lost. You have not been notified of a change in flight schedule or that someone has maliciously dethroned you from your Foursquare mayorship. It doesn’t seem that your phone has vibrated for any reason, and in fact, it didn’t. We have been so conditioned by our mobile phones, our brains interpret minute muscle spasms, subtle floor settling and clothing movement as hope for communication from another person, even if the message is automated. And when our brains have no signal to misinterpret, it makes one up. Crazy!

So here’s the Theological Thursday Jesus Juke: What if we were so in tune with God’s will, so diligent in our prayer lives, so intimately familiar with the sound of His voice, that we heard Him everywhere and all the time? What if we conditioned our hearts, minds and souls to recognize God’s voice not just when He’s shouting, not even in the whispers, but in the complete and utter silence? Cuz here’s the thing… I suspect He’s always speaking; we just aren’t listening. It’s not like the Old Testament when God would go silent for decades or centuries. The Holy Spirit dwells in every Believer. The Christian’s body is God’s temple.

Perhaps that phantom vibration is the God of the universe. Then again, maybe it’s all in your head.

Does your phone phantomly vibrate?

Having resolved to help this blog better live up to it’s name, and after spending three days in Houston, TX, I thought I’d start by listing all the things Houston is good for:

1. Saving time on ironing. The moment you step outside, all of the wrinkles just fall right out thanks to the heat and humidity.

2. Making all other Texas cities except Beaumont feel better about themselves for not being so terrible.

3. That’s all I could think of.

To be fair I will be in Houston at least 2 more weeks, so as I think of more things, I’ll expand the list.

Can you think of other things Houston is good for?