SSSIJWSENT

Sorry So Short I Just Watched a Spawn Episode and am Now Tired. So yeah this will be a short update.

I just wanna start by saying it's been rad getting a hold of people when I can. I just want to say it brightens my day when I get to talk with any of you for even 5 minutes. I just want you to know how much it rox my day.

I had a cool last couple of days! We put on our first official program for non-teamers. That means training is over, I'm an official YE trained professional in puppetry, skits, programming (as in a program of music etc.), music, relational ministry, peer cooperation, and the list goes on. There's some really funny things on the website that YE claims we can do for churches once we are done with training. Can't think of what they are off hand. Anyway, wow "what's up tired."

So, yeah first official program. It went alright. We had some sound issues and I couldn't get the projector to work so we had to make up some spiels that normally would be automated for us by the computer. And then the next morning we led a worship service that YE had mistakenly sent to the church. It was a worship service that bands were trained to do like 2 years ago. It was a Lost and Found worship service! Yes it included Oh Them Lions. It was a cool service, but we all had to learn it in about an hour. We pulled it off, but it was majorly stressful. The following night we had another family night program. This one couldn't have gone better. I got the projector to work and the sound was amazing. It was just cool.

We had a day off today and I did a lot of vegging. I watched Spaceballs, read, worked on grad school stuff, worked on stuff for my job in the band (media coordinator). Then my teammate Corey and his host family picked me up and we took a tour of Worthington, MN. They have a place much like Midway Village with old town buildings and stuff that was very cool. And I went to ShopKo to see if I could convince them to sell me Eternal Sunshine a day early (it comes out tomorrow yo, I'm so psyched). They wouldn't sell it to me, so I bought Jerry Seinfield stand up, and all three seasons of Spawn the animated series on HBO for $7 a piece. Then tonight I went out with Corey and his host sister Sara. We had a lot of fun. We went to a cool bar and played pool and Golden Tee. Then we went and met up with my teammate Sarah at her host home for a bonfire. It was fun to have freedom for a night.

(The following is a run down for those who are not understanding these terms. Don't read this if you understand everything. All of us team members often stay in different host homes. We are housed in any combination from solo to all seven off us on a gymnasium floor. Also as far as the jargon earlier about the family night program and worship service, here's some info on that. We are typically asked to do any of five things that I can think of. We lead worship at a sunday morning service, we put on a program for families that includes music/skit/puppetry/ministry info etc., we lead sunday school for little kids, we lead a workshop on a topic like puppet ministry/song writing/bible study etc., we lead youth in games for a game night. This can take place in many settings like churches/prisons/retreats etc. So theirs a little info)

I love you all and that's all for tonight.
in Christ,
jason

Would you like to hear about camp, oh?

So let me start off by explaining the title to this post. One night at camp we were having a talk in our cabin about various cultural differences between Australia, Canada, and the states...a cultural exchange if you will. My teammate deron and I decided that every country should have a vowel sound at the end of their sentences since Canada has the whole "aeh" thing going on. We tossed around the idea of the "oo" sound and "sometimes y" but finally we thought "oh" would be the best. So that's my story about that, oh.

So training. Incredible. And Incredibly crazy. Some quick highlights (please check the pictures I posted...they are all new!):

I'm learning a ton spiritually. We had a day of solitude that went from 4:30pm on one day till 7:30pm the next. It was very cool. And there's more but not gonna post it hear and now. It's just a great growth environment. Everyone is so supportive, and it also demands support from me for others. It's a very selfless kind of environment that is very different from normal life. I really hope I can retain some of the nobler qualities that have been stirred up in me after this year.

I've had a lot of fun both practicing music and interacting with people. My team is awesome. We've had some conflicts and struggles already but I really think it's gonna work out great.

We had our first semi-booking. Last week we went to a church and did a puppet show and like 4 worship songs for both services. Everyone was very encouraging which created a relaxing setting for our first booking. Plus we didn't have to do a whole lot. Some teams had to do full programs including leading games the night before for the kids.

The staff is way cool. They threw us a party the last night where they all dressed like pirates and acted accordingly. Al, the guy who runs the camp, had to walk the plank off the pontoon boat.

There's a guy on team named Nick who was friends with Luke Venstrum. Actually he was in a band with Luke at Valpo. Crazy. He's totally cool. Him and I decided to start an annual YE frisbee golf tournament at Lutherdell. We had 26 people participate. We were totally hard core about it too. We created 3 tee positions for all 18 holes and each day people played at the next hardest tee position (3 day tourny). We used different color spray paint to make the tee lines so it was pretty looking. We also created awesome scorecards which included a map of the course included the various tee positions. It was so HC. The winner got a t-shirt with the logo for the tourny on it. They signed the back of it and wrote the year next to their name. Then next year the winner of that tourny gets the shirt and adds their name to the back and so forth through the ages. Cool eh? We were gonna have a toilet bowl too and award a golden toilet bowl cleaner but it got rained out.

Okay those were just small tidbits as I could talk forever, and I need to get to bed. I love and miss you all. Thx for the letters those who have sent some. They have been utter encouragements you have no clue.

in Christ,
jason

Don't you hate when your time expires during library internet time

Okay so maybe that's not a common complaint that you have. Well, it's huge for me right now. I have a flashing red clock in the lower right corner of my screen telling me I could be booted at any minute if someone tries to come and use this computer and I have teammates trying to get me off of this computer to go finish laundry.

Sooooooo, the point. This is it. This is my post.

Thx for your emails, thanks for posting comments because I recieve them as emails and they are encouraging and fun to read. I will try and write you marcus.

Also, jeff. I thought I said "the Outsiders" for the greasers and the sosch. (refer to comments).

Jill nathan is a cool guy.

okay I love you all. I'm good. Things are crazy. This life is crazy.

bye,
in Christ,
jason