Inauguration 2009

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Perhaps it is a comment on the world today, that I blog, while watching the inauguration on streaming video on my other computer screen.

It's amazing that the documents so masterfully set forth in a very very different America 200+ years ago can carry this changing nation to the historic ceremony we are witnessing today.

I tried to capture a sunrise today, to reflect the new dawn of this nation and to reflect Obama's campaign symbol, but I had the aperture set wrong, oh well. Maybe there's a lesson in there somewhere...

9:06 AM --- Obama is now sworn in! His inauguration address is underway, and I will stop here to listen and to take it all in.

We live in an amazing country, and I'm as proud as I've ever been to be a citizen of the United States!

God Bless America!

Shake-cam

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This is a shot of Bourbon street, with my hotel on the right.

The view out my window. In that open-air patio there were jazz bands that played.

YIKES! It's been a while since I posted. Last weekend I was enjoying a hotel room on Bourbon St. in New Orleans, listening to the noise and jazz coming in the window from the crowds (Sugar Bowl) below. I was in Mississippi (Jackson) over the weekend for the Mississippi Blues Marathon. This was my make-up Portland (OR) marathon that got delayed for 8 weeks after I broke my toe last Summer. After the race a week ago, I decided to make the drive down to New Orleans since I had almost two days before my flight back (and since Jackson, MS is not too exciting a place). So I was in New Orleans for about 24 hours. It was a great time! I walked around a lot, taking in the various sites. I went to sleep on Bourbon St. with a raging Deep South thunderstorm outside, it was awesome. I caught the movie Slumdog Millionaire at a theater by my hotel, and then drove back to Jackson, and caught a plane home the next day.

This weekend (with additional days on each side) I'm Mr. Mom while Kate's in OH with her sister and parents.

We got the Christmas lights down today with no broken limbs (trees or human).

Finally, I'll post a video I made while running the marathon. Facebook followers have already seen the YouTube link (be warned, it's very shaky, and really not too exciting).



That's all folks!
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2008 Holiday Images

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Obviously there are LOTS of pictures from this holiday. I'll try to update theschiebers.com at some point to present a much larger gallery. For now, enjoy these three (you can click on the photos for a larger image):




This is one of our blue spruce out front, covered in snow.




On my way home from the hospital on Christmas morning, I took this photo with my phone out the front of the truck window, driving down 3rd Street.




And you gotta love the "Pick Your Nose" cups from my parents.

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New Life

Every birth touches the lives around it.

Seven years ago, on Christmas, I delivered a baby into the arms of it's mother and father, and family. We all knew the baby would not live. The baby had a condition that would not allow it to survive outside of the womb. For 15 minutes, an entire lifespan, this child was held, and loved, and cherished.

Yesterday I watched a young mother in tears as I discharged her newborn child into the arms of a foster mother. The birth mother had broken too many rules, put herself and her unborn child at risk too many times for her to be allowed to be primarily connected to this life she had carried for the past 9 months.

Today I was called away from family reunions and celebrations to help with the urgent surgical delivery of another child. He did fine - big and beautiful.

God comes to us this way on Christmas - in the midst of our real lives. Our circumstances are different: joyous, sorrowful, hopeful, fearful, but within it all, there is God - in our lives, among us, born into our reality.

There is the new start, the hope for the world, the word made flesh.

Because God invests God's self fully in our lives, we are changed. We have the promise that we are more than our brief time on this world, redemption when all seems broken, and the joy that comes from a creator who delights in our lives and the world around us.

Merry Christmas

1st Snow

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We're at the beginningof a 3-4 day cold snap, and have gotten the first snow of the Winter. We love it. This is the house tonight, as the snow starts to accumulate.

School tomorrow? We'll see.

(that's all I have - short and sweet)
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The Christmas Spud

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A couple years ago I penned this after a secret Santa gave me a......potato?

I turned it into a Christmas Tale:

The Christmas Spud

In the land of potatoes, the spuds were in bed
Waiting for Santa to come in his sled
And bring lots of presents and toys for the tots
The taters loved Christmas, yes, they loved it lots

But that Christmas eve, in the dark of the night
A fog settled in, obscuring the site
Of the little spud town, and the little spuds said
“How will Santa find us, when he flies overhead?”

Then a brave young potato, with a spark in his eyes
Said “I can get Santa down here from the skies
We’ll lure him with smell, for it’s no surprise,
Everyone knows he likes hot steaming fries!”

The potatoes all cheered the spud with the good heart
And carried him over to the Cuisinart
And in no time at all, the hot fries were done
And Santa did find them, and gave gifts to each one

And as St. Nick flew away, with his reindeer and sled
He turned to the spuds, and he quietly said
“Have a wonderful holiday, I send you warm wishes,
And oh, by the way, your fries were delicious”
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How 'bout them Ducks!

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Yesterday's civil war game between Oregon State and University of Oregon was one for the record books! Although the defensive strategies dominated the game, there was plenty of.......oh, who am I kidding. I didn't watch a second of it.

Actually, I don't watch football at all, or basketball, or any other team sport. I don't follow any teams, and I literally cannot name (I tried) a single football player for any college or professional team.

I keep expecting the guy police to show up at the door, kick me in the crotch, and take away my guy card.

The whole following of sports teams with anything other than a passing interest just seems so tedious. I realize I am in the smallest of minorities with this opinion. Clearly allegiance and excitement for your local team is a passion world-wide (soccer, rugby etc...), so I'm sure the "problem" is more mine than anything. I also realize that probably the more you follow, the more fun it gets.

This is a huge (relatively) problem on those occasions where I am left alone to make conversation with a bunch of guys (especially in social circles where I maybe don't know them as well). It is simply expected that I can speak with some degree of knowledge on the week's sporting events. I cannot. I mean, this is what guys do! They talk about sports. It's not the kind of thing that is too easy to fake, either. If the conversation gets far enough for me to be obliged to point out that I really don't follow, AT ALL, what's happening, I kind of get these looks of incredulity - Dude, seriously?

I'd like to point out here (protests too much?) that this does not make me a wuss. It's not like I don't know anything about, or cannot play these sports, I just do not choose to follow them. I played high school and Division III college football, I know plenty about the game . Sometimes I think it's because I spent so many hours in college on the practice field, in the drafty clubhouse watching hours of scouting films, in the bus on Saturdays driving to and from games, that I wore out all my tolerance for the sport. Maybe.

I know Kate doesn't mind. I'm not taking hours every week to watch football on TV (like I have that kind of time or concentration anyway). I like the fact that my mood for the week isn't set by how my team did that weekend, and that I can get out and do things during times when instead I would in front of a TV or at a game. And (I'll probably get in trouble for this), the whole die-hard team allegiance - with flags waving on your car or dressing head to toe in team colors, seems kind of , how shall I put this, conformingly misdirected anyway.

Ok, this is plenty on the subject. I need to wrap up this blog so I can go spend hours on the tree-climbing discussion boards, read my triathlon magazines, and re-vamp my training schedule.
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