Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Another Example of the Influence of My Early Teens

I know no one likes hearing about other people's dreams because they aren't real and no one cares about things that aren't real, but this is my blog and I can write about anything I want.

Last night I had a dream that Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey got back together and I went to their celebration concert with Keith Bueler and Tim Bartel, mentors at The Academy last summer. Nick Lachey was wearing a suit made of peanut butter, and right after they sang a rendition of "I Was Made for Loving You", Keith yelled up at the stage, "NICK! I'm hungry! Take off your pants so I can eat them!"

posted by Jess @ 9:30 PM 1 Comments

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

FCCE: Daily Meetings for Idiots and Crazy People

I should know better than to talk about work on the internet, but so few people read this that I should be okay.

In the last week:
-the pastor has announced that he is leaving and going back to a church in Texas
-he has sold his home and lied about it
-the truth came out and he tried to lie again
-he has the money from the sale of the home and he has not mentioned the $42,000 that he borrowed from the church for a down payment on his home which, as the contract states, he is to pay back when his employment is terminated or when he leaves
-the board members are threatening to sue him for embezzlement if he does not pay the $42,000

As of right now, he is driving through Texas with his family to get his wife and kids moved into the new house. He said he's flying back in on Friday, but his house is empty and he packed up his office over the weekend, save for a couple books and a couple changes of clothes. People are speculating that he's not coming back.

People have been in the church office all morning talking about this, which is extremely irritating because we can't get any work done and they all keep interrogating us! We were some of the last people to know!

Oh, and we are due in court next week because a woman is suing us because our painter spilled paint on her. He was in his white painting suit on top of a 20 ft ladder with goggles on and she walkes through a blocked off area under his ladder where he is painting and a couple drops spill on her blouse. And she is suing us for a couple thousand dollars.

Speaking of crazy people, yesterday a woman came in the office around 11:00 am, saying that the pastor said that he could help her financially. We told her that the pastor would not be in the office until late that afternoon, and she said she would wait. So she waited in the waiting room, asking for snacks (this woman was in her 50's) and talking to herself. The church has no available funds for assistance right now, and we told her that, but she insisted that the pastor had told her that he could help her. She asked Mom if she had any money the woman could have, and Mom said no, without any explenation. There are lots of agencies in Escondido that can help people like this - they can't just walk into a church and demand aide. Mom had called the pastor to warn him of her, so when he came in, he ran past her and locked himself into his office. She had been asleep in the chair and just saw him as he closed the door, and asked me if it was him, but I didn't want to let her back in the office, so I mumbled something unintelligable and left my office so she couldn't see me. When it was time for us to go home, Mom went out to tell her to leave, and she said that she was waiting for the pastor who she had seen go into his office. Mom said that we did not have any cash on campus that we could give to her, so she asked us to write her a check, but we are not authorized to write checks, only deacons can. So she asked us to call two deacons to come in and sign the checks, so we told her that we could not do that and that she had to leave. Then she yelled at us for "wasting [her] afternoon" when she could have been out finding people who could help her. Yes, because we were so unclear and vague. So she waited outside the church on a bench for another 45 minutes until we really did leave, and she asked Mom for a ride home. Mom said, "No, I am going to go home to my family. There is a bus stop at the end of the driveway, you may take the bus home." The whole time she was here, she was very demanding and accusing.

This just in: Fox Television just called us asking if they could tape our court session and put it on a reality show. Yeah, that's just what we need: "Small town church refuses to reimburse needy minority for ruined interview clothes."

posted by Jess @ 2:39 PM 1 Comments

Thursday, July 06, 2006

"You imagine songs that have never been played."

"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture - it's a really stupid thing to want to do." Im going to try anyway.

Cody, Chelsea, and I went to the Nickel Creek show last night at Humphreys by the Bay and my strongest impression of the show was, Wow, their live performance sounds exactly like their album! All three members and the bass player on tour with them are amazing musicians, obviously classically trained and dedicated to their music unlike most young musicians that made a band for other reasons than bringing exceptional music to their audience. I have loved Nickel Creek since my dad was given their CD as a gift a couple years ago, and the show made me even more of a fan because their live stuff is even better than the recorded. Their solos are all improv and they are good enough musicians to make up things on the spot that sound even better than what they had written. Sara, Chris, and Sean are also very funny people. Chris announced his entry into the Most Effeminate Song Title Written by a Man contest: Ode to a Butterfly.

They played all of the songs I hoped they would: Anthony, Reasons Why, This Side, When in Rome (!), Tomorrow Is a Long Time, In the House of Tom Bombadil, and The Fox, which after every two verses of The Fox they broke into another song of a totally different style then seamlessly glided back into The Fox. The only song that I love that they did not play was Sweet Afton, a love song adapted from the poem Flow Gently, Sweet Afton by Robert Burns. I think Im glad that they did not play it because it is such a romantic song (the lyrics arent really romantic, but the song reminds me so much of Cody because its one of his very favorite songs and it reminds me of this little valley somewhere near Julian where Cody and I walked by a stream with little purple flowers blossoming in the early spring while cows grazed in the meadow on clovers sprouting out of the soft earth) and it just wasnt an appropriate place for that song to be played. Rich folk in loud Hawaiian shirts sipping fruity martinis is not very romantic, but Nickel Creek could have almost made it romantic anyway. Almost.

I couldnt stop smiling during the whole concert because their music was just so good and they were so entertaining. The end of every song was met with thunderous applause that lasted until they started their next song or until they spoke. As an encore, they each came out and played a song like a talent show; Chris Thile played a piece by Bach on the mandolin, Sara played sang a song dedicated to her dad about coming home, Sean played a murder ballad he wrote with a guy in Switchfoot, and the band played a song off the bass players new solo record. Freaking awesome.


I should get back to work now. I just got paid for blogging. If there was work to do, I'd do it.

posted by Jess @ 5:48 PM 0 Comments