district meeting

The district meeting at church was a lot of fun. I went under the impression that there was going to be real food there. Instead, all they had were snacks such as chips and cookies. Luckily, there was a fellowship having dinner a pot luck dinner downstairs. It was a little late for the pot luck so much of the food was already gone. I grabbed a little bit of everything and went back upstairs.

The power to the grange was out. The only light was from the stairwell and from the two spotlights on either side of the grange. I talked briefly with Chris, Sara's cousin. He's been trying to get me hooked up with something at his company which I am extremely appreciative of. He has nothing to gain from helping me and I don't have much to offer.

As the night came under way, we did our best in the low lighting. We started with a game of Screaming Vikings. Screaming Vikings is predicated on a set of different rules. There is one person who is "it". Their objective is to make someone else "it" by having them fail one of the rules. The two basic rules are: 1) If the "it" person comes up to you and says, "bitty bitty bop bop bop", before the last "bop", you have to say, "bop". 2) If the "it" person comes up to you and says "bop", you are to say nothing at all. If you fail at either of these two rules, you become "it", and the person who was "it" takes your place. As the game progresses, more and more rules are added on. The classic, that the name of the game is derived is Screaming Vikings. When the "it" person comes up to you and says screaming vikings, the person he points to has to but his thumbs to his head with his palm outward and fingers up and scream. The person to their right must make a rowing motion on their right side while the person to their left must make a rowing motion on their left side, all done while screaming. If the 3 people can successfully get into this formation before the "it" person counts to ten, they are safe, otherwise, the person who messed up becomes "it". There are other rules that you can make up. Some of the more famous ones are: Charlie's Angels, where the three people have to take the Charlie's Angels pose, Jello, where the center person has to wiggle like a piece of jello and the people to either side form the bowls, and Superman, where the person in the center puts his arms forward as if he were flying like superman and the people to either side flap their arms behind to form the cape.

After Screaming Vikings, some people that are to be baptised tomorrow were introduced. They were introduced by someone that was very close to them to the rest of the group.

As the people were being introduced, power went out completely in the grange. A few minutes later it came back on and continued to be extremely sporadic. The choice was made to move to the sanctuary to complete the rest of the festivities.

They finished the introductions in the santuary and proceeded to presentations from the different 4W's. Most of the 4W's put together some sort of skit. Fran's 4W, the one I used to be a part of, made a slide show. This past November, there was supposed to be a district meeting and I was supposed to make a short Flash animation. I didn't have the time, so I never completed the project. The district meeting was also cancelled due to inclement weather. This time, they put together a slide show which borrowed some of the initial ideas I had for the Flash animation.

We then counted off by 6 and formed 6 groups to play family feud. With the unlg (log base 2) number of groups, one team was going to get a "bye". We were fortunate to win our bracket and receive the bye. Each team chose names. I suggested that we be called "Anonymous Cowards", a la /.. We eventually won the whole thing, facing off against Ben's team, the "Alaskan Assasins".

As family feud came to a close, we were informed that there was, once again, power in the grange. We all went back for refreshments.

As I was getting a drink, I saw a certain "someone" talking to this new girl, Cathy. Wanting to protect my sister, I did the one thing any good Christian man would do. I warned her. I saw my chance when TJ left Cathy to get some snacks. I quickly walked by her and non-chalantly told her to, "watch out for that guy". She didn't hear me the first time, so I repeated myself.

A few minutes later, they were talking again. Then TJ ran out of food again, I suppose, and left her. I approached Cathy and explained a little bit about our good friend. Apparantly, TJ is rather quick with his advances. In the short time that he talked to her, he already tried inviting her to dinner. Not wanting to be a gossip, I did my best to resist telling Cathy any of the numerous stories I knew. I felt that it was safe enough to let her know that TJ's tried to pick up women who were engaged.

We spent a few minutes talking. I found out that she's in marketing and had graduated in 2000, so a little older. We talked briefly about our families and where we lived. Not wanting to seem like I was putting the moves on her, I introduced Cathy to Ni-fei, who happened to be the first person she met at CCCNJ. Ni-Fei had grabbed a little too much cake, so Cathy offered to take some of it. Not wanting to eat it with her hands, I offered to get one for her. A nice way out of the situation.

I spent some time talking to Julie afterwards about MBA programs. She told me that I would probably want to do production with my MBA. This would allow me to do software development and more with the initial concept than being a code monkey. This was pretty much what I wanted to do with my Computer Science degree.

Julie also talked about the benefits of being a teacher, which was one of my long long term goals. Think, 35~40. The biggest draw was the retirement plan. Since teaching is a goverment job, you get great benefits. You get full medical and a pension. I also want to do a little more with my life than just making the rich richer. Teaching high school is a great way to make an impact in kids' lives. I remember some of the teachers that were really big influences in my life, and I hope to be one as well.

It was closing on 10:30 so we all had to leave. I made sure I said goodbye to Cathy before I left and inquired if she would be going to church on Sunday. She said that she was feeling a bit under the weather, so I left it at that. I put on my headphones and walked out the door.