It’s funny. I finally get the urge to blog again, and then life gets too hectic for me to write. I guess that’s how things go. Good times.

So what’s new…well, work’s been really busy…coming home at midnight most days. I teach Caleb Baek and Zach Preslar piano now, so that’s exciting.

Oh, and my dog died.

RIP little buddy

…

I call Dodger “my” dog, but that’s for succinctness’ sake. Out of everyone in my family, I am the person least qualified to call Dodger “my dog”. My sister was the one who wanted a dog; my dad took care of him…Me? I petted him every now and then for a few minutes whenever the fancy struck me.

It’s strange…I mean, I know I didn’t have much of a relationship with Dodger…I mean, I lived with him for maybe a third of his life, if that? And it’s not like I should have been surprised by his passing. Each time I came back he’d have some new malady to show off to me. Sure, he’d try to hide it by doing the same tricks he’d always done, but each time, he’d be a little slower, a little lamer, a little older. And there was no hiding what was going on with his eyes.

So, I should have been ready for this. And even if I was blindsided…I mean, it shouldn’t hurt all that much, right?

But it’s been a couple of days since my dad told me now, and there’s still this little pain in my stomach that just won’t go away. And I’m wondering why.

It’s definitely not because we shared crazy memories. I don’t have the pictures that I see other people post on Facebook.

The one enduring memory I have of Dodger really just goes to show how little I invested in Dodger. After a couple of years of college, James Kang was visiting in San Ramon. I can’t remember why, but we decided to take Dodger for a walk. I hadn’t seen Dodger for a while, so I didn’t realize how much Dodger had changed in the last few years. Dodger was fat. He didn’t walk around the house as much as he waddled.

Anyway, we took him out to the nearby doggy park where he could play with all the other doggies. As you know, dogs have a habit of sniffing each others’ butts. Some people say it’s the way they say hello, but I’m pretty sure it’s more like a game for them. Each dog tries to sniff the other dogs’ butts without getting their own butt sniffed. Yeah…I don’t get it either.

So there’s every other dog, dancing around, trying to sniff butts without getting sniffed, and then there’s Dodger. The way I see it, Dodger was the only dog smart enough to realize that there are no real winners in this game. So he was just chilling in place, maybe waddling side to side a little bit to try to stop other dogs from getting too fresh.

After the dogs had finished their greetings, a few of the owners started throwing balls across the park for the dogs to fetch. It was pretty cool to watch. A veritable stampede would form every time an owner threw a ball. Big dogs, small dogs, it didn’t matter. Well, except Dodger. Dodger would half-heartedly trot toward the ball, figure it was too much effort, then waddle back to get petted.

The point is, Dodger was kinda fat. And that’s cuz we didn’t go out together nearly enough for walks.

But you know, I think I miss being able to just pet Dodger for a while. Whenever I was feeling emo, I could always count on Dodger to be there and just sit with me. I’d never actually say anything aloud to him, but I felt like he understood.

More than anything…I think I’m just realizing that he’s gone. And he’s never coming back. And it’s not like I’ve actively looked for him in the last nine years, but now that he’s gone, I wish I could see him again. Figures right? There’s a lot of regret too…I wish I had a lot of pictures of him to post of us playing together, but I don’t.

This seems to be devolving into emo-territory, so I think I’ll stop here. Till next time.

-Tim

Don’t really have anything fun to talk about these days, so I’ll go with something serious. If you’re new here, trust me, I don’t usually do write about this kind of stuff.

…

I watched this video online yesterday, and it kind of bothered me. It’s nine minutes long, and I understand that that’s a lot of time these days, so I’ll try to sum it up for you.

It starts with an exchange between a reporter and Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook. The reporter is taking a look at Facebook’s news feed, and asks Mark Zuckerberg, “Why is this so important?” The dude has a point. I love reading my wall, but it’s not what you would call “essential.” For every post telling me that someone’s gotten engaged or had a kid, there’s ten posts filled with videos or photos of cats.

Quoth the Zuckerberg:

A squirrel dying in front of your house may be more relevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa.

It’s an incredibly cold thing to say. The scary thing is that it’s true.

The video goes on to explain that Web companies have started to personalize the pages that we peruse on the Internet. For example, Facebook has a filter that shows us the most relevant news items. Netflix and Amazon have algorithms that show us the movies and items that we would probably be most interested. Great. Saves us time, right?

But apparently this is happening with Google. Turns out, Google’s search results are personalized to you too. If I search for “basketball”, I will get different results from when Joe Sixpack in Alaska searches for “basketball.” In this case, I doubt Joe would get the link that I get for purchasing San Diego State basketball tickets.

Still, this doesn’t seem so bad. I really am interested in San Diego State basketball tickets (as long as they stay good). Why am I so worried about this?

The problem is when we merge these two facts:

1. Web pages are becoming personalized to me.
2. In my spare time, I like to look at funny pictures of cats.

…

Basically, the Internet is starting to pander to us, a society that cares more about the dying squirrels in front of us than the dying people in the world. And by doing so, it is effectively filtering out all the stuff that doesn’t already fit our own comfortable, predefined worldviews. Which is scary. We disparage the Internet censorship that happens in other countries all the time. Well, as it turns out, we’re also being censored. By our own stupidity.

I think what bothers me the most is that there’s no one in this situation that I can blame other than myself. I can’t blame Google or Yahoo News (yeah, the news are getting personalized too!), since it’s my own choices that define what I see. If I click on links to games more than I click on world stories, well, it’s my own fault if I just get more games in my searches, right? I guess I could get mad at them for using those algorithms to “help” me, but oh wait, those algorithms are what I’m studying in college.  Oops.

I dunno. I think I might be overreacting, since I can still get to the news I want to. (I think.) But it’s frightening to see some of the results. In the talk, the dude has two examples that kind of scared me. The first is where a guy types “Egypt” into Google, and doesn’t get a single link to a news story about the protests while they’re going on. The second is in Facebook, where eventually, all the conservative viewpoints disappeared from the speaker’s wall since he clicked on their links less often than the liberal ones. I think we’d kick up some controversy if this happened elsewhere, right?

…

Well, I’m done. Sorry to come back with such a downer. I know I’m starting to get on my high horse once I start using words like “society.”

-Tim

Even 25 wasn’t all that bad, since I felt like I was entering the prime of my life.  But now I’m 26, and I’m officially closer to 30 than 20.  I’m old.

And yes, I know, I’m not really that old.  And I apologize, since it kind of stinks to hear younger people complain that they’re old.  Collegians complain to me about their age all the time, and all I want to do is slap them upside the head.  Rule of thumb: if you’re younger than me, you’re not old.  Unless you’re Joo.

But the thing that really makes me feel old is that my parents tried to set me up for the first time.  Of course, my parents are my parents; they weren’t really blatant about it.  My dad and I were on IM, and it went something like this:

Dad: Hey, there’s this girl that we want you to meet.

Me: Wait, are you trying to set me up?

Dad: No, we just want you to meet her.  You know, e-mail, and if anything happens, well…

Me: You’re totally trying to set me up!  Thanks, but it’s OK.

Dad: Don’t you want to know anything about her?

Me: It’s OK.  I mean, is she even Christian?

Dad: Actually, yes.

Me: Oh.  Well, is she cute (delete delete) it’s OK, I don’t really wanna be set up.

Dad: OK, well, if that’s what you want.

I don’t really know why I have such a bias against being set up.  Part of it is that I feel like it just shouldn’t happen that way.  I feel like it should start organically, say with a chance meeting outside of an elevator.  Our attraction will be immediate, but unspoken.  After a series of zany misunderstandings, we’ll realize that we’re meant for each other, and…I have GOT to stop watching romantic comedies.

But I think the main issue is my pride more than anything.  I know it’s wrong, but the first thing I wanted to say to my dad was, “What, you don’t think I can find a girl on my own?”  And that’s completely not the point.  And even if it was, it’s not like I have girls knocking down my door right now.  The last time a girl approached me was a couple years ago.  I remember because it was when Andrew Kim came to visit me.  Or more accurately, Susan came to visit Heidi.  It must have been just after Black Friday, because I remember wearing this grey Gap sweatshirt that I had bought for $5.  (Andrew: Nice, Tim.  Bringing back the 1980s!)

Anyway, we decided to take Andrew and Susan over to Hash House for breakfast, since it felt like a good part of SD to show off.  We were told that there would be a 15 minute wait, which we had come prepared for.  So we wandered off a bit so that we could talk for a bit.  After about five minutes, the girl comes over to our group, looks me straight in the eye, and says, “Here, let me do something for you.”

My first reaction is to look behind me to see who she’s really talking to.  (A lifetime of being around/living with other Tims has trained me to look around before responding.)  But to my amazement, there is no one behind me.

So I turn back around, and I realize that the girl is walking uncomfortably close to me.  And the fight-or-flight adrenaline is kicking in.  I mean this literally.  In my freshman year of college, I got slapped in the butt when I was standing in the cafeteria line.  My first impulse was to turn around and get into a ninja defensive stance so I can fight off…the girl with the mortified look on her face, stammering, “Sorry, I thought you were someone else” before slinking off.

Fortunately, this time, I am in enough control of my facilities that I don’t ninja chop her.  But I can’t really figure out what she wants either, so I just freeze.  And she’s just getting closer, and closer…and she reaches her hand out…touches my sweatshirt…and rips the “M M M M M M M” sticker that I had forgotten to peel off.

We had all been quiet while she was approaching, but then Andrew has to break the silence with this: “Man, if you were better looking, we wouldn’t have to wait another 10 minutes.”  Yeah, I know, Andrew.  Shush.

…

Well, enough of that.  Hopefully I’ll be updating more frequently…until I don’t.

-Tim

…

Yeah, no good excuse here.  If I did try to come up with an excuse here, it would just be an attempt to make a lie sound reasonable.  So yeah.  Screwed up, moving on.

So much to say right now, so little time.  Maybe in a few days.

-Tim

…

Oops.  Got a bit sidetracked.  I just taught Sunday School for the first time, so I was focusing on the passage that I was going to teach for the last few days.  And then I went camping, which was awesome.  Funny how camping is so much more fun now.  I used to hate camping as a kid.  Now I finally appreciate the little things, like rowing a boat, or seeing a sky full of stars.  It’s also the only time I can imagine where killing fish, wielding hatchets, or setting fires is socially acceptable.  You do that kind of thing in real life and you’re a serial killer.

Fun note: we almost started the great fire of 2011 (it’s every four years in San Diego, right?)  It all began after dinner, where we were all too full from meat, corn, and fish to fully enjoy the other campfire food that we had brought.  So we figured we’d play a game of Settlers, then start a new fire afterward to eat the S’mores and Smokies. (We would have played Monopoly Deal, but my copy’s at Terrence’s place.  If you’re reading this, Terrence, this is a note from me to remind you to remind me to remind you to bring me back my copy.)

The problem was that we only took one car to the campsite, so we had to skimp on some things, like sufficient amounts of firewood.  No problem; we just hatchet-ed a bunch of firewood from the surrounding area and brought it back near our pit.

Right before we started playing, one of us noticed that a log in our fire was pretty much unburnt, so he fetched it out of the fire and placed it near the rest of the wood.  All of us saw him do it, but no one thought anything of it.  Then we retired to the tent to set up Catan.

As we were battling it out, we all noticed a really strong burning smell, but no one really said anything about it.  I mean, we had all just been eating around a firepit for like two hours; EVERYTHING smelled like smoke.  And besides, I was too busy worrying about the lack of sheep in the game because my stupid 8 wouldn’t roll.  (I WAS SUPPOSED TO HAVE A MONOPOLY!!!!!)

After Brian whooped us twice (I think he’s won every single game of regular Settlers I’ve ever played with him),  I was eager to wash away the taste of defeat with S’mores and Smokies.  But…where did our firewood go?  And why was there a bunch of ashes where it used to be?

Well, the log we retrieved was MOSTLY unburnt.  So it set our firewood aflame…right next to a bottle of lighter fluid.

Fortunately, we had placed the pile of firewood (and lighter fluid) on non-flammable ground, (what’s the opposite of flammable?  Inflammable means flammable, right?) so there really couldn’t have been much damage.  And I just researched lighter fluid fires on YouTube, and they seem kinda lame.  So…meh, MLIA.  Whatever.  At the time, it was pretty scary.

…

I mentioned that I taught Sunday School for the first time, right?  It’s pretty tough.  It doesn’t help that I had a passage that was (I think) kind of hard.  Exodus 15-19.  Quick, off the top of your head, what’s that about?  Well, I’ll tell you.  It starts right after the Egyptians drown in the Red Sea…and ends right before the Ten Commandments.  So I was teaching on Moses’ song of celebration, the Israelites grumbling (three times), and God laying out the tenets of His covenant to the Israelites.  Keep in mind, I was teaching 2nd to 5th graders.

I know I should have realized this before, but it’s REALLY REALLY hard to keep the attention of young kids.  I thought I’d be able to hold their attention longer by continually asking questions, but that only works so well.  So I was feeling pretty good while teaching on Moses’ song (since it was the beginning).  I was feeling somewhat OK for the middle (since it’s got manna, and that’s kind of like Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs).  But by the time I got to the end, I was kind of panicking.  I just couldn’t think of a fun way of presenting that God promised Israel that they would be a treasured possession, a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation.  It didn’t help that I had to explain the meaning nearly every word.

But you know, after the lesson, I was sitting with my kids (I teach Matthew, Caleb, Megan, and Cameron).  And they have this workbook that they fill out based upon the lesson.  And of course, the page is a fill-in-the-blank, on (what else?) the specifics of God’s covenant.

I’m thinking to myself: OK, these kids didn’t know what “treasured”, “possession”, “kingdom”, “priests”, or “holy” meant.  I’m probably going to have to go over this again.  Then Megan, bless her heart, asks me, “How do you spell ‘possession’?”

I’m like…”What did you say?”

“How do you spell ‘possession’?”

“P-O-S-S-E-S-S-I-O-N”

“Oh, like Mississippi!”

“Yeah, like Mississippi.”

Turns out, Cameron didn’t need help either.  (He has really good handwriting, too.)  And the others weren’t far off either.

I realize this more and more each week I’m with them…but man, these kids soak in everything, even if they don’t seem like they are.  I’m just being insecure in wanting them to appear attentive for twenty minutes, which, when you think about it, is a really long time.  My parents complain about sermons that long.  I would too, if I wasn’t already conditioned by Eastbay and Lighthouse.

Anyway, that’s what I’ve been thinking about these past few days.

-Tim

…

You know, people used to ask me what kind of music I listened to while working all the time.

Well, a few people did, anyway.

Well…I distinctly remember one person asking me.  And I remember answering something like, “Oh, it depends on my mood.  Sometimes I’m in the mood for slow piano music, sometimes I’m in the mood for rock, sometimes I’m in the mood for show tunes.  You never know.”

That answer is technically true.  It’s just that more often than not, I’m in the mood for slow, sad songs.

I realize this now because of an incident a couple of days ago.  I was still self-deceived, so I had dumped all my songs into a giant playlist and hit shuffle.  And the first song that came up was “Round Here” by Casting Crows.  For those of you not familiar with the song, it is five minutes and forty seconds of pure emo.  Just a guy picking some strings on his guitar and wailing about…something.  And I loved it.

(I was going to post the official music video, but frankly, it’s just annoying.)

So there I was, in my post-emo-song afterglow, and then this happy guitar riff invades my headphones.  Didn’t even think twice; just went to the “Next” button and got some sweet Alicia Keys going on.

Then it hit me.  Wait, did I just cut off a Christian song?

Went down the checklist: Basic 4/4 rhythm with a constant bass kick?  Check.  Mostly major chords?  Check.  Acoustic rhythm guitar?  Check.  Electric guitar riff on top?  Check.

Crap.  I totally cut off a Christian song.  And sure enough, it was “At the Cross.”

Now, at this point, I felt kinda guilty.  But then I started rationalizing.  I mean, I didn’t mean to do it.  I didn’t get the part where they started singing.  And it’s not like I can pay attention to the words to the song while I’m working anyway.  And dang it, sometimes a guy’s just gotta be emo.

I compromised by putting on a slower semi-Christian song.  “O Magnum Mysterium.”  Yeah, kinda fail compromise, I know.  Doesn’t help if the Christian’s song’s lyrics are in Latin.  But you know, by shutting off “At the Cross”, I thought about the cross.  And isn’t that the point?

(Yay, Impressions!)

-Tim

Matthew 7, Genesis 7, Romans 7, 2 Thessalonians 2, Acts 7

-Tim