My name is John Daker

I'm thinking of checking out the First United Methodist Church next Sunday. Anyone want to join me?

Scooby Doo Boo Hoo

Scooby Doo: Ripped from the Headlines? Score: 50% (5 out of 10)

My Scooby knowledge is somewhat lacking. How's yours? Gotta run and get me a Scooby Snack now.

National Lost and Found

U.S. Department Of Lost And Found: We Found Your Flip Flop

I've Discovered Onion News Network

Tired Of Traffic? A New DOT Report Urges Drivers: 'Honk'

I'm Booooooor-ing

You are a Black Coffee

At your best, you are: low maintenance, friendly, and adaptable At your worst, you are: cheap and angsty You drink coffee when: you can get your hands on it Your caffeine addiction level: high

What Kind of Coffee Are You?

Random Observations

4Old guys who jog shouldn't wear those short shorts.

4Pomegranate juice is all over the place. Have you noticed? I enjoy it. I especially enjoy the Odwalla lemonade made with it.

4It's hot outside.

4Favorite hot weather beverage: Grande Starbuck's Mocha Frappucino

4Favorite cold weather beverage: Medium Caribou Skim Mocha with whipped cream

4Just when you have something really important to print the printer runs out of ink and you have every color except the one you need.

4In keeping with that line of thought, it makes no sense that if the printer is out of yellow ink you can't just print something in black. Conversely, if the printer is out of black, it makes no sense that you can't just print something in blue.

That's enough random ovservations for one day.

Love this Song

A few months ago, Nikki loaned me her CD of "The Afters".

Go to their myspace and listen to the song "Wait".

It's lovely.

Church Shopping

Here's a link to "A Little Leaven". I have no idea who the people there are, but they came across a list from a pastor in Nashville that details questions he would ask if church shopping. "A Little Leaven" then adds commentary.

If church marketing makes you weary, it will make you laugh. Or, maybe it will make you cry. At least it might help you decide what not to look for.

To his credit, I did check out the link to this pastor and noted a photo outside the Loveless Motel and Cafe. So, he does have good taste when it comes to breakfast in the greater Nashville area.

Life and Doctrine

I Timothy 4:16

ESV says: Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers.

NIV says: Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.

I have been thinking about this verse and think that it is much easier to "watch your life" than it is to "watch your doctrine."

It's easier to make a list of do's and don'ts. It's easier to teach people lists of do's and don'ts.

Doctrine sounds boring. Like something only "dead" theologians in "dead" denominations care about.

It is interesting that Paul puts actions and thinking together in this list. And not only that, he goes on to say that proper doctrine/teaching is critical to our salvation and that of those who listen to us.

So, be on the lookout for bad doctrine. I think the best way to do that is to be familiar with good doctrine! Which brings us back to "the Word".

Joel Osteen Teeth Whitening Kit

Enjoying a Beverage

As mentioned, the favorite pastime of our new neighbors is "enjoying a beverage".

Apparently, they give degrees in this at Bethel College.

Back to the saga of the neighborhood.

Saturday night.

10:35 pm. Mrs. D turns on Saturday Night Live and within minutes is asleep.

Mr. D wakes her up and says, "You gotta see this. Beth and I were watching out her window. There are police searching the neighbor's backyard with flashlights and they came into our yard and were just beneath Beth's window looking around the fence area."

Police leave.

2:37 am. Drunk girl and drunk guy have been talking loudly by the pool all night. We can hear every word they are saying. Suddenly drunk girl falls in the pool and comes up laughing and coughing.

3:00 am. Neighbor Mike across the street has had enough. He gets out of bed, walks over to the drunk people and tells them to be quiet. Drunk people leave, driving over Mike's yard.

Sunday.

Tyler, the Bethel grad/renter of the house comes over. He thinks we called the Cops on him the previous evening. 4 marked squad care were there. We say we didn't, but did call on previous occasions for "Unconscious Girl", "Shoved into Coffee Table Girl", and "Brawl in the Front Yard People".

Tyler apologizes and says all those things happened while he and his brother were in Iowa helping on their parent's farm. I tell him that the crowd while he was gone looked like prostitutes and pimps (I'm trying for that XXX blog rating). He says he feels bad because one of his roommates hangs with a bad crowd, but that guy will be moving at the end of the month.

Tyler also feels bad because he and his brother want to buy the house and they also enjoy a beverage now and then and he feels that it is ruined for them to have any parties now because the neighbors are all mad. He then says something like, "My brother and I will still have parties, but there won't be any prostitutes." (I guess Bethel has to draw the line somewhere.)

I say, "So, there were prostitutes there?"

He says, "Well not prostitutes, but women of doubtful character."

Last Night.

11:45, there is a knock on the door. We were still up. Mr. D looks out and sees Tyler. Tyler is holding a disorderly house ticket and drunk. Tyler looks up at Mr. D wondering if he called the cops. Mr. D tells him we didn't and looks at his watch and says to Tyler, "It's 11:45." He tells Tyler that he looks like he has been drinking. Tyler says that, yes, he had been enjoying a beverage. Mr. D. tells Tyler to go home and sleep it off.

This kid needs help. How sad that you can be a recent grad of a Baptist College and be so messed up.

Signs that you might have a drinking problem:

You drink every night.
You get drunk when you drink.
The police are at your house 2 or 3 times a week.
There are naked people in your pool.

Aloha

Thanks to Ingrid from Slice for this little Saddleback "venue tent" tidbit.

I want to worship Hawaiian style. Here's what the Saddleback web page says about the Island worship tent:

"Ohana Come for the worship... Stay for the sounds of the islands. Experience hospitality and hugs. Learn to worship through signing or hula. Room 404 near the Beach Cafe and island huts."

A church with a Beach Cafe and island huts? It's just what I've been looking for.

Now I gotta run. Paula White will soon be on and I don't want to miss her.

Mahalo.

Tozer Quote

Here's a good Tozer quote.

“Let me give you a good working rule for the understanding of Scripture: if you haven’t more than one verse to support it, don’t teach it. Because if it isn’t found in more than one verse of the Bible, the chances are it isn’t found there, either.”

Food for Thought

I was reading something by Piper last week and came across this about The Word. It was written by George Mueller. Here it is...food for thought.

The point is this: I saw more clearly than ever that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was to have my soul happy in the Lord. The first thing to be concerned about was not how much I might serve the Lord, how I might glorify the Lord; but how I might get my soul into a happy state, and how my inner man might be nourished . . . Before this time my practice had been at least for ten years previously as a habitual thing to give myself to prayer after having dressed in the morning. Now I saw that the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the word of God and to meditation on it, that thus my heart might be comforted, encouraged, warned, reproved, instructed; and that thus, while meditating, my heart might be brought into experimental communion with the Lord. I began, therefore, to meditate on the New Testament from the beginning early in the morning. The first thing I did, after having asked in a few words the Lord's blessing upon his precious word, was to begin to meditate on the word of God, searching as it were into every verse to get blessing out of it; not for the sake of the public ministry of the word; not for the sake of preaching on what I had meditated upon; but for the sake of obtaining food for my soul. The result I have found to be almost invariably this, that after a very few minutes my soul has been led to confession, or to thanksgiving, or to intercession, or to supplication; so that though I did not, as it were, give myself to prayer but to meditation, yet it turned almost immediately more or less into prayer. When thus I have been for a while making confession or intercession or supplication or have given thanks, I go on to the next words or verse, turning all, as I go on, into prayer for myself or others, as the word may lead to it; but still continually keeping before me that food for my soul as the object of my meditation.

The result of this is that there is always a good deal of confession, thanksgiving, supplication, or intercession mingled with my meditation and that my inner man almost invariably is almost sensibly nourished and strengthened and that by breakfast time, with rare exceptions, I am in a peaceful if not a happy state of heart.

Now that God has taught me this point, it is as plain to me as anything that the first thing the child of God has to do morning by morning is to obtain food for the inner man. As the outward man is not fit for work for any length of time, except we take food, and as this is one of the first things we do in the morning, so it should be with the inner man. We should take food for that, as everyone must allow. Now what is the food for the inner man? Not prayer, but the word of God; and here again, not the simple reading of the word of God, so that it only passes through our minds, just as water runs through a pipe, but considering what we read, pondering over it, and applying it to our hearts.

By the blessing of God I ascribe to this mode the help and strength which I have had to pass in peace through deeper trials in various ways than I have ever had before; and after having now above forty years tried this way, I can most fully, in the fear of God, commend it. How different when the soul is refreshed and made happy early in the morning, from what it is when, without spiritual preparation, the service, the trials, and the temptations of the day come upon one!

Got It!

Missionary 57 times, punch 3 times will get you the coveted NC-17 rating!

Missionary

I thought it would be fun to try for an NC-17 rating. Here goes.

Last night we had a delightful visit with our nephew Jon who is a missionary in Japan. He had just arrived in MN to take a little break from being a missionary. His wife Hiromi who is also a missionary came, as well. In addition, their missionary daughter Rebekah flew in with them.

Their other missionary children Michael and Lydia were already here.

They left to begin their missionary work in the mid-80's so have been doing missionary work for over 20 years. Imagine that, 20 years as a missionary.

Do you think I have used the word missionary enough to get a worse rating. Just in case I haven't I will offer you one last word.

Missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary, missionary.

End of experiment. Wish me luck.

Update and New Rating

Just an update. Mr. D and I spent about 2 hours at the Bloomington Police station yesterday chatting with an officer about our neighborhood situation.

For those of you who were worried, "Unconscious Girl" was located at Fairview Southdale Hospital. Her sister brought her in later in the evening. I think he said her blood alcohol level was .17. She was born in 1990. Very sad.

From what we could piece together, when a report of an unconscious person being stuffed into a car (it happens all the time!) is issued and a description of a vehicle given, the police pursue the vehicle first. Makes sense. Then, it sounded like they notify hospitals in the area to report any behavior that fits the incident. In this case Fairview Southdale contacted them later in the evening, so they didn't pursue it further with us.

The policeman who we discussed this with got a printout of the activities of the last couple weeks and read us the report. The arrest we observed was for assault (is that how you spell assault?) in the coffeetable incident. There was a serving alcohol to minors charge and some others. Then, there was a list of a bunch of names of people they had identified at the party. The police officer said it read like a Who's Who of all the drugies in Bloomington.

What a sad way to live...in an altered state and with no hope.

Pit Bulls and Airedales

Mr. D and I went out for our evening walk about 8:15. We stopped briefly and were having a nice chat with our neighbor Lee across the street. As we stood in the street near the curb, the door opened at the party house. The two pit bulls came bounding out unleashed at Mr. D and me. One jumped up on me! Imagine that, his pit bull paws on my legs!

Now, the thing is, I am allergic to dogs. I like them. I don't touch them or my eyeballs puff up. It's not pretty. So, I am standing in the street, partly freaked because I don't want my eyeballs to swell up, but mostly freaked because a pit bull is jumping up on me and I don't want to get him mad.

I tell party boy to get the dogs away from me. Mr. D tells him in no uncertain terms to get those dogs on a leash.

We walked our two miles and on the way up the hill, from across the street, an airedale puppy comes bounding at us. Now, I think airedales are cute, but they still make my eyes puff up if I touch them. So, I'm telling the owner to please call his dog, the owner is running across the street telling me he's just a puppy (well duh?). I guess he was trying to explain his frisky, out of control behavior (the dog's behavior, not the owner's).

Seriously, someone needs to tell dog owners to keep their dogs restrained.

Which reminds me of my cousin Dianne who raises prize winning sheep. She knows how to protect her sheep. She once took out a coyote in one shot while sitting on the riding lawn mower as her husband drove. A moving coyote, a moving vehicle, one shot. Way to go Dianne.

Some new neighbors with a Rottweiller and a Mastiff moved in across from her farm. She went over to meet them and they said, "Just give us a call if the dogs get out." To which she replied, "If your dogs get into my sheep pen, I will not be calling you. I will be getting my shotgun." That's how things work in the country, I guess.

A note to my favorite dog Molly. Please don't take this personally. You are my favorite dog in the world. I love how your little tail wags while you sit on the living room floor listening to conversations. Plus, you never jump up on me.

Cops

As mentioned, our neighborhood is turning into an exciting episode of Cops.

Back to July 3rd. We were visiting with Mr. D's brother Toby when we received a call from Beth asking when we would return. She told Mr. D that there were 21 cars in the street. It was 7:30. Mr. D thought she was joking. She wasn't.

About 9:30 when we left to go see the fireworks at Lake Normandale there were only a handful of cars left at the party. They must have gone to the fireworks, too. (Now that is the topic of yet another blog post. It seems they do fireworks in Bloomington on July 3rd because it is more efficient. Probably cheaper, too, since they don't have to pay people holiday wages to work that evening. I hear they may move Christmas to December 27th so people can take advantage of the half price Christmas goods on the 26th. Now back to Cops.)

When we arrived home about 11:00 there were 27 cars parked on our street. We went to bed about midnight. Just as I was arriving in the Land of Nod, there was a knock on our bedroom door. It was Beth informing us that there was a fight going on outside. Thinking that it was just another loud party, we told her to try to ignore it and get to sleep. About a minute later, there was another knock. It was Tim saying he thought there was a fight going on outside. We figured something other than the normal, loud late night partying must be happening since the kids are used to that.

Sure enough, a look outside revealed about 30 people in the front yard embroiled in a drunken brawl. Mr. D said, "Get the phone." I went to call 911 and he went to the window. All of a sudden a bunch of people said, "Let's get out of here." They scattered, running all directions, and getting into cars and driving all directions.

When the police arrived, there were still enough fighting to give the police something to do. All Mr. D could really observe were photos being taken by the police, outside and a flash going off inside.

On Saturday, we were at Starbuck's and ran into some neighbors with a relative who is a policeman. This unnamed relative said that one evening (we're not sure which one) there were 10 underage drinking violations issued, a disturbing the peace ticket, and, if I remember correctly, a narcotics arrest. This relative found one of the underage drinking violations ripped up in the street, pieced it together, and found the girl's blood alcohol level was .20...perhaps this explains unconscious girl. If you are the girl who ripped up that ticket, please be informed that there will soon be a warrant out for your arrest.

Since we all love the Constitution and know that police can't just enter someone's house without cause or a search warrant, the police have a new strategy. They are lining up (like the cabs at the airport) in a nearby cul-de-sac and as the party "guests" drive off they are following them looking for drunk driving behavior.

There has been no cause to call the police since that day, but did I mention that the kid who lives there has two pit bulls that wander into our yard? They are the neighbors from H-E-double hockey sticks!

I've decided that the loving your neighbor as yourself thing means getting them some help and right now I think the safest place for them is detox or jail.

All's Quiet on the Western Front

As mentioned, all's quiet on the western front. The southern front is a different story.

Now back to last Friday night.

About 10:15 in the evening, as the crowd next door grew larger in size and were of a more altered state, I was monitoring the situation by standing in Beth's room and listening. At this point I heard the renter of the house appear on the deck and say, "Hey, let me tell you what just happened downstairs. That one girl (apparently the guests names are unknown) just slapped that black guy and he shoved her onto my coffeetable and broke it."

At this point, not wanting another girl to leave unconscious, I called 911. This was call number two of the evening form me. I was giving the guy the info, along with a tirade on how my daughter (and all of us in the neighborhood) had to listen to this horrible talk late into the night at least three nights a week. I also mentioned that I thought there was underage drinking and prostitutes (there goes my G rating!). As I was speaking, Mr. D came in to report he had heard the renter say, "She's bleeding all over the place." I relayed the info to Mr. 911 and he immediately said, "We're on the way."

Now, don't get me started on Bloomington 911, but apparently it takes blood to get them moving. They didn't seem too troubled about "Unconscious Girl" since it took 2 calls and 20 minutes to get them to come. Back to Friday at 10:30.

We went back to the window to watch and listen. About 5 minutes passed and we heard a voice yell out to those in the pool area, "The cops are here. Get inside now." There was a scramble, the lights in the pool went out and the flood light on the deck went out. The sliding glass door was closed and the curtains pulled tight.

It was dark and silent....for about 3 minutes.

Then, suddenly, from the back gate (the one the girl escaped from earlier when the police first visited) the yard lit up and the police came rushing in to the deck. There was a girl sitting on the deck and a guy standing there. The policeman said to the girl, "Are you okay, you look like you are crying?" Immediately, the guy started answering for her and said something like, "She's okay, she just..." at which point the policeman said, "Shut up and let her answer my question."

We couldn't hear her reply, but the next order on the agenda was heading in the house to do ID checks. There was a lot of yelling at the police (how stupid is that). We noticed our neighbor Mike standing in his driveway watching the spectacle, so we headed over there (they have a more complete view). There were at least 4 regular patrol cars and two unmarked cars (we couldn't see around the corner so maybe there were more police cars). About 20 minutes after the police arrived, an ambulance showed up, drove slowly by and left.

One arrest was made (I'm guessing underage drinking, but don't know for sure) and the renter was holding a piece of paper (we're guessing a disorderly house citation). The girls could hear him say, "We've learned our lesson, officer. We were just trying to have some fun." To which the policeman said, "That's not fun."

It was really quiet after that. In fact, it was so quiet it was hard to sleep! In fact, it was pretty quiet till Tuesday evening. But, you will have to wait till later to hear that story.

In the meantime, I have to figure out how to download my photos of the 4th. It was another magical evening watching fireworks from the beach at Excelsior, wearing glow necklaces and bracelets, and enjoying a perfect night.

Arrested Development

They're baaaaaack!

Yep, the police returned to the house next door to us last night at 1:00 after I called them for the 3rd time since Friday. Mr. D has only called them twice since Friday.

We lived by the old Sears on Lake Street when we were first married and never had to call the police. Okay, maybe Mr. D called the police when his stereo equipment was stolen and oh, yeah, the first night he moved into the Midwest Challenge house (it was a Christian halfway house and he was a Bible teacher/pastor there) a guy was murdered in the back yard, but after we got married and lived there, there was never a cause for calling the police.

Where to begin. First of all I will begin with a lecture. When you partake of large quantities of malt liquor, you think you are having some quiet fun with friends. You don't realize that you are talking really loudly and the whole neighborhood can hear you. You also don't realize that your vocabulary becomes limited to one adjective that starts and ends like the word "firetruck", but isn't the word firetruck. You also don't realize that 2:30 in the morning probably isn't the best time to be talking loudly, using that one particular adjective (which generally is used that loudly and publicly by drunk 20-somethings and the occasional edgy pastor speaking at high school retreats).

Also, if you are partaking of large amounts of the malt liquor and inviting 20 to 30 carloads of people to a suburban neighborhood at least 3 nights a week and partying till 2 or 3 in the morning, you might just have a teensy, weensy drinking problem.

Mr. and Mrs. D put up with that behavior (which began the first weekend in June). No calls to the police for the drunken behavior and rude language that has kept us up or woken us up many a June night this year. We kind of felt sorry for you.

However, when you decided to have a more "edgy" crowd over last Friday that involved no more than 3 "girls", and one of them came in a miniskirt, fur hat, and high heel fur boots, and one was skinny dipping in your in ground pool in full view of the neighbors and it was only 6:15 in the evening, Mr. D called the "non-emergency" police number and gave them a hint that maybe someone needed to check out what was going on. Oh, this was after he heard skinny dipping pool girl screaming. It didn't sound right, but she wasn't screaming for help, hence the call to non-emergency. I arrived home shortly after the screams.

Now, just a tip for you girls out there. It's probably just not the best idea to go skinny dipping at all, but especially not in a pool area where you are the only girl surrounded by a bunch of "men" drinking that malt liquor. Just a little tip for you gals.

I went across the street to check with the neighbors about what they heard and saw. Mike saw skinny dipping girl from his deck. They all heard the screams and Ruth was on the phone with a different neighbor who had also heard the screams. Then, Mr. D came over and said, "I just called 911 when three guys came out with an unconscious girl." (She was slung over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and two other guys helped stuff her in the back seat).

We went home and 10 minutes or so had passed and still no police! So, I called and relayed the story about skinny dipping girl and expressed some outrage that a girl had been hauled out unconscious at 6:30 in the evening and the police hadn't shown up. They came about 10 minutes later and they talked with the brother of the guy who rents the house (the renter, a recent Bethel College grad I might add, wasn't at home). He must have given them a story about why a girl was unconscious and slung over a guy's shoulder that they believed. They walked through the house, talked a bit more, then left.

As the police arrived, Mr. D observed a girl run out the back gate. Oh, yes, there was also a nasty fight going on between a couple of guys right before the police arrived.

After the police left, Mr. D and I decided to go for our evening walk. We got to the end of our driveway and observed a disoriented, hard looking girl coming down the street. She approached us and asked if there was a blue house with a pool. We recognized her as the girl who escaped when the police arrived. We told her there wasn't a blue house with a pool, but that the house right next door to us has a pool and we pointed to the house. She thanked us and started walking up the driveway to return to the party.

I said, "What's going on there?" She said, "A couple guys got in a fight and I got scared and left." Mr. D said, "Yeah, I saw you leave by the back gate when the police arrived." She said, "I don't know this neighborhood. I'm not from around here. I'm from the country," as she proceeded up the driveway. I said, "Go back to the country, it's safer there."

Well, that is enough for today and we haven't even gotten to the arrest on Friday at 11:00 or the 1:00 in the morning visit last night to stop the drunken brawl in the driveway involving 30 or so guests.

Bet you can't wait. In the meantime, Happy Birthday, America!