The Bear Hunt

This year has flown by. I can't believe that yesterday was Christmas day. It seems that as you get older the years seem to pass faster and faster. I am resisting the urge right now to get all sentimental and reminisce on the year that was - I'll leave that till next week :p

Christmas day we spent at my sister's new place in Beckenham, and of course there was way too much food and as a result I spent most of the afternoon feeling bloated. Fortunately, I was still able to bust out a great beat on Guitar Hero World Tour playing drums. I was sucked into that game for a good few hours.



Hutch and Beau were dressed for the occasion also. Hutch spent most of the afternoon eyeing-off our food.

I noticed the other morning that the badger is still enjoying digging-up our lawn on a daily basis:



The badger doesn't seem to be leaving on his own, so we (and by we I mean Dad) will have to take some action against him. I think we should bait him into a cage and trap him. If he's cute, we'll keep him.

It made me think of some lingering issues in my life - issues that I haven't taken any action on. I guess I've kinda just hoped they would disappear. But issues don't seem to do that, do they? I remember a preacher at Planetshakers compared problems to bears - they always seem to track us down, no matter how fast we think we can run or how well we think we can hide. They are highly proficient at seeking their prey. There's no easy way out with bears - we need to sleigh it - kill the problem or issue that we're having.

Doing so may require humility .. or courage .. or perseverance.

Most of all, we need Jesus - without Him we're fighting bare-handed. If we ask Him for help, he will provide the tools we require. It may not be an easy fight, but we will be victorious.

This reminds me of a book I saw in Borders last week that I recognised from primary school - The Bear Hunt.

"We're going on a bear hunt, we're gonna catch a big one. I'm not afraid! Are you? Not me!"

Lord of the Flies

March flies... a painful pest known to be ever-present at various picnic locations. We had lunch at Canning Dam after Church on Sunday and invented a new game called whack as many march flies as possible and then put them into the march fly collection bottle. It was a real hit (no pun intended). Before we commercialise it, I think the name would have to be reconsidered. But I can safely say that I was a pro at the game - whacking around ten march flies, compared to everyone else's three. They seem to be attracted to black people and their black jeans (but who wouldn't?).



All in all I think we collected around about twenty march flies. Sunday was really the first time in a good while that everyone has hung out as a big group. It was promising.



We tried spitting on the X's on the bridge below ... Susan had the best aim! I couldn't spit with accuracy even if my life depended on it.



I baked some cookies tonight to give to the elderly couple - Mavis and Leslie - living next door as a Christmas present. After writing the Christmas card, I thought I'd just better ask mum to see if she'd already given them a card (otherwise it would be a bit strange receiving two cards from the same family). I was then told that Mavis is a Jehova's Witness and didn't celebrate Christmas.

Spew.

I guess I'll just take them to work tomorrow to share.

I caught up with Jono today after he finished work, and as expected he told me that he had a great time in Singapore. It made me realise that a lot can happen in five weeks, and somehow the last five weeks has been quite challenging in many ways. It's been draining - both physically and emotionally, sometimes uncomfortable, many times enjoyable and ocassionally unbearable. But at the end of it all I can safely say that I am alive and well, blessed beyond my means and surrounded by God's love. Three years ago last week I chose to walk this path, and I'm in this for the long haul.

Rain, hail or shine, I will keep running.

Over it

I finally came around. I'm so over Facebook. It's cool how you can share photos (probably the reason why I kept it for so long) - but I'm now just at the point where I don't care if Jane (I'm making up names btw) wrote on my wall, Frank wants to be my friend, if Sue replied to a thread or if Tom is watching TV.

Seriously, how do people get addicted to it? It's so superficial ... but moreso it's just plain boring! So I took some action and closed my account. I won't be so in the loop, but I will survive.

I went for a walk the other day and was surprised that someone went to the effort to liven up the alleyway at the end of my street.



I wonder if the plants will actually survive.. chances are every dog walking through there will pee on them. If I was a dog I probably would :p I'll make a point of walking that way tomorrow morning and see how they're going.

I started my new job last Thursday - it's going pretty well. I'm trying to adjust to the different workflow of the lab, making a few errors along the way =/ but I'm getting into the swing of things thankfully. Tomorrow is day number four, and I'm hoping I can get through a day without making a boo boo (although even the experienced people make mistakes so I shouldn't be so hard on myself). The people are really nice though, and the close proximity to home is definitely a bonus!

Our neighbour tells us that a bandicoot is using my car as a shelter at night, which I'm cool with I guess, just as long as it doesn't turn into some crazy Jumanji scene where my car is hijacked by a bandicoot and monkeys. It explains the random holes in the lawn - I thought it was dad's poor attempt at irrigating the lawn. Dad thought it was the magpies scratching up the grass searching for beetles.

I must be off to bed soon, I'm quite tired after working hard today.

Be diligent in my search.

Poser

I'm not afraid of going to the dentist. I never have been really. It wasn't until I was laying in the chair with a large instrument tightly fastened around my top-right wisdom tooth and the dental nurse holding my head securely in place that I thought I may have to re-evaluate my disposition towards the dentist. I was having my first tooth extraction. With a sharp twist and pull, the tooth was removed. To my surprise, the procedure was completely painless.

It went so well that I didn't just stop at one tooth, but I had the other top wisdom tooth removed as well. Don't get me wrong - I'm not some tooth-extraction addict - the other had to be removed also. I just figured that while I'm on a roll I might as well get the other out. My sister was a bit freaked-out by the fact that I brought my teeth home:



Saturday was Tony and Amanda's wedding. It was a small crowd, but a wedding nonetheless. It was a pretty casual ceremony, hence us being able to take photos of ourselves :p



I went shopping with Shaun today and we were checking out some sunnies. I seem to have lost my pair of Arnette's, so I'm thinking I'm going to have to invest in a new pair.



Queer much?

Something else a bit queer that's been going on at Church lately is the sharing of hair. In particular, a mullet wig (featured in Jordan's Peter's Trumpet - Simplifying Summer ad).



We got an email at work the other week reminding everyone to wear their ID badges. It was argued that badges allow staff to be easily identifiable by others - particularly by patients. Some people had become a bit slack in wearing their ID. Some people just simply don't like wearing it - they don't like displaying it, or couldn't care less if they are meant to stand out.

And God showed me that sometimes we forget to display our identity as a follower of Christ. I have been in situations in the past where I've neglected to wear it, or it's been easier to hide it.

We need to discover our identity in Christ and display it proudly. I don't want to hide in the shadows when times get tough. But I want to stand prominently in God's light.

God help me to be sincere in my faith.

Au revoir

I really didn't want to go to work today. Not because I hate my job or anything - quite the opposite in fact - I love my job. Today was my last day working at the lab in Murdoch, and in a childish sense, I felt that if I didn't go to work I wouldn't have to say goodbye to everybody. Let's hope Armadale has some equally friendly people to work with.

I did some baking yesterday in preparation for my farewell morning tea - banana choc chip muffins and carrot cake with lime and mascarpone icing. The carrot cake is always a crowd pleaser.



It took me a good hour to clean up the mess ... grated carrot is one of my least favourite ingredients to clean up.

We ended up having a feast for morning tea - I should have actually taken a photo of how much food there was. It was insane. I honestly didn't expect such a great turnout..! I think the most unexpected gift was from the cleaners - I'm gonna miss them too! Don't tell them though that I only knew one of their names ... after a few months I realised that it was probably a bit too late to clarfiy what their names were, so I just left it!

I just splurged over $130 on shirts tonight ... I blame the poor-performing Aussie dollar - the total price was $86USD which equates to around $134AUD. But I justify spending the money because two of the shirts are Christmas presents for mates. I have a feeling I'm going to have to dip into savings over this Christmas period ... but I guess that's to be expected.

Tomorrow I'm off to the dentist to get one of my wisdom teeth removed ... my first tooth extraction - I'm not sure what to expect. I'm guessing that with the advances in medicine it will be somewhat painless!? Here's hoping I guess...

I called Jonny today ... kinda woke him up - sorry bro! I assumed that he and Rainer - being interns and all - would be up early (I called at 7:40 Singapore time) but was enlightened by the fact that Ps. Daniel doesn't even wake up until after 10am! So much different to our culture! My bad.

Be My hands and feet.

Time out

The weather at the moment is fantastic. We're finally experiencing the spring weather that I've been waiting for.

I took advantage of the weather and went for a bike ride around the foreshore. First I rode through East Perth. The houses here cost millions of dollars to own. And they're not even that big!



Riding along for about 15 minutes brought me out to Riverside Drive. Suprisingly, there were quite a few people out today ... they can't all be uni students like me can they? Don't they have jobs to be at - it is Monday afterall!



I found a spot right in front of the Boat Shed and had my lunch. Healthy, of course - Salad, kiwi fruit and an apple.



Twas a good time to relax and chill with God. I feel as if I'm at the start of a new season - a new season of growth and action. God is prompting me to do things that are out of my comfort zone, but will help to develop me.

I also had a look at some of Jono's photos of his time over in Singapore ... man I'm wishing I was over there! We haven't Skyped yet, which means he must be having a great time over there. But I'm looking forward to going away somewhere at the end of next year when I graduate.

Jethro is having a bit of a problem at the moment too. He can't output through his HDMI port. I called HP Tech Support and "Mark" (I use quotation marks because I'm certain it's just a pseudonym - the call centre is in India) tried helping me - to no avail. A Tech is going to come and personally visit and hopefully diagnose the problem with Jethro. I reckon it's a hardware defect. We'll find out on Wednesday what the prognosis is.

Be as un-'cliquey' as possible - and they'll have no choice but to follow suit.

On top of the waves

If I ever say I can do anything, I'm lying. Last night was testimony to this. Me and a few mates got together at Coogee beach to do some fishing, and I ended up catching no fish. Zilch. Nada. Maybe next time. Not all was lost though - it was good hanging with Tony - I don't see him a lot so I was happy to spend some time with him.

I still don't think Alisha likes me. It's 'cause I'm black.

Looking at the sunset, one thought persisted in my mind - "It's so great to be on holidays."

What's at the bottom of the sink?

It's the question on everybody's mind. Well not everybody's - mainly mine. My curiosity was sparked a while ago when I saw my asian friends cleaning the dishes using running tap water instead of filling the sink with dishwashing liquid and hot water. Apparently they are weary of the bacteria living at the bottom of the sink.

So I wanted to get to the bottom of this - is there really bacteria living in our humble sink? I devised a quick experiment to figure this out:

Two different swab samples would be taken from the sink- one first thing in the morning (to see if any bacteria are there under normal conditions) and another after running hot water with dishwashing liquid and emptying the sink. A negative control was done to confirm aseptic technique. These swabs would then be plated on a few different agar plates.

The plates were inoculated and incubated for 24hrs. The results are shown below. Note the order of the agar are: Blood, Choc, MAC and CNA.

Swab 1 - four colonies


Swab 2 - two colonies



The results were interesting. There were four different colonies present on swab 1 - showing that some baddies grow in your sink overnight and will remain there unless the sink is cleaned. Good news though - sample 2 shows that dishwashing liquid and hot water effectively kill a lot of the bacteria present.

So, looking at these results, I'm still going to wash my dishes in the sink.

On a different topic, depending on which days you visited my blog, you probably noticed it changed appearance a few times. I was playing around with a few different designs and have settled for this one - I like it a lot.

Last night was youth and AllStar was a bit low in numbers - the lowest we have had so far. I had this strange experience during the praise - it felt as if we were just putting on a show for the kids, and it reminded me of something that's been on my heart a bit lately - we really need to be seeking God on behalf of these kids - because He is the one who changes lives. He is the one who can make them whole.

Success and Failure

I did it, finally. And I think I passed! It was my first exam this morning.

Before I blog any further, let me introduce you to the newest member of the family, Jethro:

He's a bit of a spunk, isn't he? He is of the HP species. The next sassy individual to make us a trio will be the yet-to-be-named backpack of Crumpler origin:



So now to the failures ... I was procrastinating the other day and wandered over to the site failblog.org to waste some time and I had a wonderful time laughing at failures! One of my favourites:


Ouch.

Sorry Natalie, but your parking was a bit of a failure last Wednesday night:

I walked into Coles this afternoon and saw a sign that grabbed my attention. You see, in retail, it's pretty bad if you advertise a special, but don't have any stock to supply the customer. So to save face and keep the customer happy, the finger is usually pointed at someone else ... but in which direction should they point? Funnily enough, I was talking to Kristy at work on Saturday and we've realised that the universal excuse is a train derailment. Apparently Toyworld currently have no Nintendo Wii's due to a 'train derailment', and Coles seem to be crying 'train derailment' also:

It seems these train derailments happen quite often ... are people injured? Is stock damaged? Why don't we ever see this on the news?

And this got me thinking ... sometimes we use universal excuses in our lives. When there's a discrepancy in our character or actions, we quickly pull-out a universal excuse. We want to cover-up what's really happening. We want to keep people happy. We want to save face.

But God wants us to be real with ourselves and each other. He doesn't want us to hide behind excuses or lies, but He desires us to be honest. And despite what our flesh tells us, people will value and love us for our honesty.

Scooter pie.

'Tis the season to be jolly?

Yes, that time could be nothing less than exam time.

But there's nothing sweeter than studying hard, and then chillaxing with a mate and taking a hike! You'll understand when you see the photos:

We hiked to the top and enjoyed our packed dinner:

• Tuna with crackers
• Celery
• Yogo
• Fruit

How's that for healthy? Cheap too - $7.40 between us both.
Jonny leaves on Sunday and for me it's the most inconvenient time for Jonny to go overseas - I'll be on uni break with plenty of free time and nobody to spend it with! (hint hint people ... I'm available to hang soon). He's gonna have such an awesome time though.

A lot has happened since my last blog. Yes, it was a while ago - my apologies - but I just can't seem to priotise blogging above studying. I'm thinking that's a good thing though! Since then:

• I bought a brand spankin new laptop, named Jethro. He's very attractive.
  

• I created a Skype account, with absolutely no idea how to use Skype. Add me - jason.bevo.

• I have been offered a job at PathWest in Armadale - an exciting opportunity for me!

• The Bible teaches us not to judge, so keep that in mind when I say this - I watched High School Musical 2 and loved it. Bring on HSM3.

To my fellow studyers, all the best in your exams :) Study hard and achieve the marks you deserve. Stick close to God and you'll find the stress will fly right over your head.

Hoola hooping fabulous.

In the prime of my youth

Busy is an understatement. I've been non-stop super-duper psychodelic freaking-out brain-busting flat-out over the last week and a half! But I have set some time aside from the freak show to write to you, my faithful readers.

So I thought I would take this opportunity to introduce you all to a few things I have learned over the past week.

1. Unfortunately I'm not destined to be a hip hop icon as my heart so desires
I put on my attire and busted out some gansta moves last Friday, but I've been told that I just don't make the cut. However, when juxtaposed with my white acquaintance Chris Anderson, I appear much blacker than I actually am.



2. After a tiring day at uni, I'm not too good at games that require brain function
Brown Nutella smudges on your face is not the aim of the game in this activity. Each incorrect answer results in a bit of sticky hazelnut goodness on your face. I epically failed in this game - a total of nine smudges on my face.


3. After losing at the Nutella game, it's best to wash your face before ushering at Church the next morning
Enough said. My bad.

4. Preparing for exams doesn't necessarily require studying your work
In this case it requires walking into Coles, spotting a huge Red Bull display, seeing a price tag for two four-pack Red Bulls for $15. Regular drinkers of Red Bull will recognise this as an incredible price. For those of you playing at home, that's a saving of $4.98. Bargain.



5. I get nervous bleeding people I know, so Matt has two holes in his arm as a result
Matt asked me to bleed him and I did ... after missing his vein once. I got all nervous and his veins were a bit hard to feel. He was comforted, however, knowing that his colesterol fell into the normal range.


6. At the end of a busy week, nothing beats a warm smile
Even if it is yellow. That's Liz from work - note the ring on the finger, fellas ;)

Even at the end of this tiring week I can still say I've enjoyed it. Jesus is on my side and nothing this crazy world throws at me can pull me down.

Jolly Hockey Sticks.

Tagged

Labels are great. They're good for, well, telling you what something is. There is a point, however, where it is possible to go a little over the top with labels:

There's a guy at work named Duffield (who also happens to be Second in Charge). Last week he went just a little spastic with the labels and now there are labels left, right and centre around the lab.

But how do you bring this to someone's attention? How do you gently tell them that they have an OCD with labels? I'm not sure. So I just went for the approach that comes most naturally to me and that is to take the mickey out of what they've done.


So I made a few labels of my own:










I think I got my point across.

This morning Ps. Dave Reardon was our guest speaker at Church this morning - I emphasise because he hasn't been gone for very long! But he brought a ripper word as expected.

How much do I value my faith, my purity, my holiness... enough to protect it? Because the devil is trying to steal these things from my life, and I need to value them enough to protect them. He also said one thing that really spoke to me: we learn more about who we are in the tough times than in the good times, in the shadows than in the sunlight. Therefore let's embrace the tough times, because in the rough edges we find out who we really are.

Grouse.

Breaking the habit

I did it again. I do it quite often, and trust me, it's very frustrating. You think that you've overcome it and BAM! You've done it again. I've been trying to break the habit, but it's just not working for me.

I left my lunch at home.

It was such a bummer.. I was really looking forward to my Healthy Choice Mustard Chicken with Rice, even if I did take it straight from the freezer. Instead I went to the staff cafeteria to check out what goodies they had to offer. We say the food there is a bit 'hit and miss'. Today was a big miss... so much that I opted for the vegetarian meal. That will learn me for forgetting my lunch.

Tonight I went to Clancy's in Canning Bridge with my parents for what has been described as the best fish and chips. I must admit, they were pretty good fish and chips, however I was disappointed with their Chai Latte. Note the new Bonds jacket I'm wearing. Purchased from Myer last night in Perth at a bargain price:

RRP = $54.95
Sale Price = $30.00
Checkout Price = $7.50

I couldn't believe it - I bought an awesome jacket for $7.50! Was it an error? Or was it just a great bargain? I'm not sure but either way I'm a happy chappy!

Afterwards, being the social butterfly that I am, I hung with Petey and Matty (aka the homosexuals). I thought I'd try to nick off with some of Pete's clothes but he was wise to my plan.

It's awesome having brothers who really care for you, and it's great being able to support and just enjoy each other's company as we serve God together. The more love I give out to others, the less I keep for myself.

Chickety boo.

Vegemite and a musical

You wouldn't believe it. But I did it. Some may shudder, others may empathise with me. Some would argue that I've done a terrible thing, but I disagree.

I watched High School Musical.

But it's not like I purposely went to the video store and hired it out. It's not even mine, I'm just the mediator between Liz and Nishe. I'm supposed to be returning it to Nishe from Liz but I managed to watch it in the process.

And I have to admit, some of the songs are pretty catchy! But then at the same time, a lot of it is very naff!

What can I say? I'm an overall fan of kid's movies! So that's my confession for the week.

In other news, one lovely person has given the humble Vegemite jar a use in addition to housing concentrated yeast and vitamin B. Apparently it is also a handy jar to keep around the house in case you need to give a spot urine sample! Bless their little cotton socks, they took the doctor marking the test as 'urgent' a little too literally and mustn't have had the time to use the sterile container provided.


Last night me and my good friend Jono went to check out the new Big W store in Armadale... quite impressive. Whilst bumming around Armadale I realised I've come to love my local suburb. There's nothing like walking through Memorial Park and seeing a group of youths street drinking behind a shopping trolley (do they realise we can see through it?). Or another group of youngens trying to bum a cigarette from the security guard.

It just reminds me that there is so much room for God to move in Armadale!

Hunky Dorey.