a cat's heart beats twice as fast as a human heart, at 110 to 140 beats per minute.

anyone that calls me friend knows that i never speak very highly or kindly of myself.
one: i think people can get carried away with it. the may start just as building self confidence or trying to help someone understand who they are more. but it always seems to keep going. they start talking them selves up when no one asked. they start getting overly confident and see them selves as better than others (or better than they really are).
two: i just flat out think it's rude. you may feel different. that's cool. that's just what i was told growing up. maybe that's wrong. no matter, because this is only a briefing before my topic.

i'm a good friend.

that's my quality. my certain je ne sais quoi. what sets me apart.

i try to please all and fight for all. sometimes that gets me in trouble. sometimes it doesn't work. i've learned that if it doesn't work, it isn't meant to work that time (this is a more recent revelation and the first time i've said it to myself). that, however, does not stop me from caring too much and fighting for you as if you were my own (until you tell me in your way to stop).

in a way, this is what helps me read people and make me good at working in retail and the customer service industry.

yeah... i'm a pretty good guy to have in your corner... (TOOT TOOOOOT!)

the nose pad of a cat is ridged in a pattern that is unique, just like the fingerprint of a human.

it is truly beautiful to see the snow fall at the beginning of spring. fresh white powder, freezing cold. flowers in blossom, trees in bloom. i have never experienced anything like this in my life. that seems to be the reoccurring theme these past weeks, months, years even. i'm still new. i've seen a lot and experienced more than a good amount of other people my same age and same socio-demographic. i still seem to miss the "stories" and "responses". when is a man wise enough to live in the time God has given him, and not in the past or future? i know many men that are two and three times my life span and/or experiences and still don't seem to have that wisdom, mindset, focus. saturday i was FURIOUS. i woke up with that mind set. i think i may have fallen asleep with it, too. i picked fights all day. i said things out of anger and frustration i am still trying to make up for. i also blatantly felt His pull and saw His signs. i shrugged them off as coincidences and hocus pokus. i knew what it was! i could recognize Him! and i still did this!...

what if i don't learn the wisdom in time? what if i don't find that mindset? what if i fly by that focus and make fun of it? what if i already have?

His endless love and forgiveness is incomprehensible, and it endures with me forever.

i am asking this week. And i will be watching, waiting, listening.

cats have 290 bones in their bodies, and 517 muscles.

if you ever see a red dog playing with a shovel, you should throw your sand bag back to the fishes. it's more realistic to have ducks in the shoveling position than a red dog.
however, if you find you only have fishes in the sand bag, the optimal place-age for the raccoon would be south. the running cork board joke isn't that, just that the water cooler is out dated. friends who are finding the fishes should report immediately to the food stamp line for check in. i
suppose that's a tad bit racist, but i've never found tables to be 3 leg worthy. you see, my summer sausage isn't made the same as the wheat eggs. talking through the process of making either would take decades, if not seconds. it's all relative to grass anyways. if the blades are facing south after there trim, they need to be sharpened. waiting for the sense to come never works, though. the red pup will always come back and get into your fish sack. then you'll sharpen that cork board know
ledge of fine tables and blades with a summer sausage snack. that's why you came into my head cold anyways, right? so, why not follow it to sir jimmy dean's camp for a more thorough look at who you think you are
?
beards are a must.

a cat will snore while sleeping near you when it is very comfortable with you.

who has God created me to be?

hmm... that's really tough to answer right now.

i am a 24 year old man who was born and grew up in clearwater, fl. i am tall and heavy. i have brown hair and blue eyes. i have tattoos. i love animals. i know i am finding words and friends that put meaning to my feelings. i know it is my purpose to help my wife achieve her purpose. it's my dream to help her live her dream. i am good at selling myself, and whatever i am being paid to sell. that's a lot of who i am.

am i who He wants me to be?

"God like do plenny fo you guys, cuz dass how he stay. He like hemo you guys from da bad kine stuff you guys stay in, if you guys trus God strait out. No mo notting you guys can do by yoaself. God make lidis fo you guys. Dass jalike one spesho present God get fo you guys. Da tings you do by yoaself, eh, no talk big, cuz no worth notting. God da One wen make us guys how we stay now. He wen make us stay tight wit Jesus Christ, so now us guys can do good kine stuff. Even befo he wen make us, he wen make ready all da plans fo us guys fo do all dose good tings." (Fo da Efesus Peopo 2:8-10)

yes and no?

i feel i am where He wants me to be right now. of course hindsight is always 20/20 and i could be closer if i did things different.

how can you say 'i AM who God wants me to be.'? it seems to me it will always be a work in progress. that's why it's 'to become'. it's a strive. it's a goal with no end in sight.

God has this open invitation for us because through our stroll towards His goal for us, He's trying to get us to know Him more. this isn't news to most of you...

we need a venue. that's the thing we're missing. we're missing where we live. your surroundings. where He has put you. (trust me, when you find like minded people who are a couple steps ahead of you, you see what you were thinking.)

be open. be available. be strolling.

an average cat has 1-8 kittens per litter, and 2-3 litters per year.

Christmas was different this year. it was our first. it was our first up north. our first without our families. one thing that was similar this year, as in years past, somehow seemed more revealed. we went to Christmas service with our friends at a small non-denominational church in the country of ohio. it read the same as ones i've heard in the past. the same a lot of people have. a couple Christmas tracks. followed by children performing touching Christmas related skits/songs/dramas. then the Christmas sermon. this speaker decided to add a reading of a writer that was writing to inform us that we don't care enough about Jesus. the sermon was an acronym for L.I.G.H.T. . it started to blur about mid way through the I, i think. there was a little boy slightly more entertaining in the row up that we were getting our entertainment from. the main idea was the what was the same as years past. God is to be feared and He could take everything away if He wanted. i'm not going to go into a debate about theology and this pastors/congregations beliefs versus mine. all i wanted to say is that it made me aware of the fake personalities and nonacceptance this church and others i've attended put out. that made me angry on Christmas eve. we did have love with our friends, which is what the point was.

a cat's normal temperature ranges from 100.5 to 102.5 degrees fahrenheit.

Lord,

help me meet who i can be.

cats whiskers grow to the width of their body.

it's come to my attention that beauty is relative. 

the fall leaves changing color and dropping to the ground is something i have never lived through. i have only seen pictures, or maybe driving through it, like most Floridians. it's something i recommend to everyone. seeing the vibrant colors become more and more real day by day. slowly they fade into the color of the trees' bark. they fall like rain over you and the ground. the trees turn naked. the ground covered with these colors only He could imagine. we trample on them. the ground becomes cold and saturated. pushed onto the sidewalks. then to the gutter. run over and blackened. they turn to mush. sliding and moving slow, you try to keep your step. the sky is grey in and out. the weather is what November is.

what December holds for east-central Indiana, is only in His mind.

the coloring of the leaves, the falling, the mush, the tall twigs, the grey. they are all new and beautiful. it's something you aren't used to seeing and feeling...

they are here. you hear their discontent. the dreading of ice scraping, salting, shoveling, switch repeat. our excitement makes them feel confident in our ignorance.

they are wrong. so are we. we had His beauty all along. the beaches, sunsets/rises, space shuttle launches, green trees year around, soft sand, Publix, soft grassy yards, cool water, and such that goes with Florida.

you become detached.

you learn to agree that God creates. we need to accede what He has made for us. no matter the place, season, time of day.

only one out of every 3,000 calico cats are male.

so...

     a little awkward.

          i haven't written my thoughts down                 publicly in quite awhile. all i wrote             then was dark, disturbing, and                     mostly non-linear thoughts.

               new starts are refreshing. hear,                  goes the first bomb.

don't get me wrong. i know He loves me no matter what i do/think. i just can't wrap my CHS high school grad with SOME USF  college and no degree brain around it. His forgiveness, i can't comprehend that, but i can understand that i can't comprehend it, so i take His word for it. it's more His tolerance for our apathy towards Him. how we fade in and out of conversations with Him. at times even fading out of what could remotely resemble a relationship all together. for days? weeks? years? a lifetime, until we reach our ending... to me, that does not seem probable. so it's not why so much, but how do we claim we know the Guy? if you lost touch with your best friend from elementary school, picture them. now you run into them 15 years later. do you know them? take a friend you catch up with every once in awhile. when you do catch up, it's," ya... evryting's graat... we be all'iet...". no real catching of anyones ups or downs. how about your spouse/significant other/parent. if you go 6 days with out saying more than,"Hey.", and then act like you are buddies at the first of the week, you'll be howdie-dandy? doubtful. you don't know them. you don't know what happened to them that week/catch up period/15 years. so why do we act like we do? why does He let us think we are just picking up where we left off? love? yes please. forgiveness? well yeah. we know that. we said that first. but how?! for His name's sake! how!? how does He do it? over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and (deep inhale) and over again. each time acting like we've been in touch the whole time. i dunno... i've been kickin' it around awhile. milling it over with my Bud. shootin' the breeze with the Duders. jibba jabbin' with Jimmy (not Jimmy Limmy).

well this was my best first shot i think. shoot me now, if i got the rabies and i'm comin' toward the ol' Radley place.