my ode to my cars...

for any of you that know me, you know that I have had a few cars in my lifetime...maybe that's an understatement. In just 4 years, I've owned 10 cars! again, for any of you that know me, you know they've been mostly pieces.

last week, I entered a new land in my car experience...the land of the brand new. Crazy for Cody Anderson, I know! I figured that I needed something consistent in my life, that I needed to end this pattern of buyin different cars just to add change to my life... and that doesn't cause a problem until you start losing money on them real quick. that was my story, most of the time....

I bought a 2007 Hyundai Accent, and I am in it for the long haul! It doesn't make it so hard to be in it for a while when it's something you really like, something that you enjoy driving.

As I was thinking about all the other cars I've owned, I realized I have driven quite a plethora of makes and models. I want to list them down here, from the first car I owned back when I was 19 to the present day.

Here is my list of the beauties over the years, enjoy:
-1994 Dodge Spirit (the first, and a memorable one...the tranny blew in the first week. Chris Klowak now has owned it for almost 4 years...kudos to you klowak.)
-1992 Chevrolet S10 (I felt hot in this one, my first truck. my uncle darin gave this truck to me, what a graceful jesture...I kept this one the longest out of all the cars I've owned thus far. goes to show that sometimes free gifts are the best gifts.)
-Freaking old truck camper (o.k. so this isn't a car, but it's a notable mention because it's so rediculous...i had this brilliant idea to go out one saturday and buy a camper. I've always been in to those things, and I found this old one that fit in a truck, and since I had a truck, I thought it just made sense to buy it. I got it for $400, strapped that baby on my little S10 with tie down straps, yikes!>...and had the scariest ride I've ever had in my life on the perimeter hwy back home. I think when my parent saw this big rediculous piece on their driveway they knew the full extent of my addiction.!)
-1986 Nissan King Cab 4X4 (this one was a piece of work, I mean literally...It was a two toned "I till yuo whuat" redneck rock crawler...it had 31" wheels, and plenty of rust, I sold it probably 3 weeks after I got it, but not before bruce reimer and I took it on the floodway to bury it in some mud)
-1979 Volvo 242DL (I was living in Portland, Oregon and thought I had some extra money. I saw this beauty in the classifieds for $800, I went to look at it and got it for $540...I put a paint job on it, and kept it until I left Portland. I definately ended up losing money on that one!)
-1991 Subaru Loyale (I gave my truck to Erik while I was out in Portland because he wanted it to do reno's on his house...this just gave me a good excuse to buy another car! this is what I bought, what a sweet car... Erik now owns this one, it's still ticking, literally now.)
-1984 Volkswagon Rabbit (my pastor owned a 1979 Rabbit and loved it, so I figured I'd buy one and test it out, figuring that 1984 was just as good as his awesome 1979, oops...this turned out to be the biggest mistake car I have ever owned! What a joke, I'm still paying off the repairs on this one! A friend and I drove 3 hours to look at it and buy it, and when I got it, it needed about $1000 worth of work!. this whole experience is way better to be left in the past, right dana! you live and you learn)
-1989 Dodge Aries K Car (after my bout with the piece that was the Rabbit, I figured I'd step up in the car world and go to this one! I bought if for $600...I kept it for a few months, and then gave it away to some great folks I know, they are still driving it)
-1986 Jeep 4X4 (I picked up this piece from a sketchy dude in the north end...It was definately an impulse buy, and thus I ended up selling it 2 weeks later...I made the most money on this one when I sold it though, about $500, and also gained a crazy story in terms of the people I sold it to)
-1992 Buick Century Wagon (I bought this from an old man who had babied it, it was a sweet looking ride [at least I thought it was] and all it needed was a roof rack to be really awesome...done and done. I sold it because I was going to try walking everywhere, I made $100 on it.)
-1982 Volvo 240 GL (so my walking excursion lasted 10 days, and it ended as soon as I laid eyes on goldie locks here. this gold volvo gave me awesome memories of the 1979 Porland Volvo...this is the most recent used car I've owned, in fact I still own it, and I'm trying to sell it, because...)

That brings me to my 2007 Hyundai Accent...it's a sweet ride...this list will halt now for at least 5 years...I hope you enjoyed the show.
-cody.

why owning a dog seems wierd to me...

I was driving down a street near the church I work at and saw someone with their dog. A sight that I've seen thousands of times in my lifetime, but this time I was struck by it...

See, I saw this lady and her dog, and I saw that the lady had a plastic bag around her hand watching her dog intently...the dog was walking around sniffing the ground looking for the next best place to take a terd fergusson...and the lady...she was watching it as if it was the most exciting thing in the world!

That's not the wierdest part though, the really odd part of this, to me, is that people actually choose to do this! I mean think about it, this lady walks around with a plastic bag on her hand, hoping her dog will take a deuce, and then she just grabs that nasty ole' thing and walks home carrying her dog's crap in triumph because "sparky" was a good boy and went.

People actually choose to do this.

Wierd.

when there is no air conditioning...

so after a long winter, it is finally really starting to feel "summery" outside. with that, if you live at 690 Jackson Ave. you are in a tall house with no AC. I mean today it was only about 23C, still the warmest day of 2007 thus far but nothing compared to what's coming, and it's freaking warm in this house already.

That's alright though, I'm burning calories just living here in the summer months. I guess it just means I can get most of my excercise watching the NHL playoffs.

I'm alright with that.

professor popsicle made me pee pee in the cold tank...

yesterday I experienced something that I have never experienced before...

I was a human lab rat.

Back in the fall I had heard about this masters student who was looking for human lab rats to experiment on. He is a student who is working under Dr. Gordon Geisbrecht (A.k.a. "professor popsicle"). Professor popsicle has his own lab in the Max Bell Center at the U of M, and this is where I went yesterday to enter death for 5 hours...this is how the story goes.

I showed up at the U of M at around 11:50am. I am a punctual kind of person, and like to not be rushed when I go to anything. As I walked into Room 211 at the Max Bell Center, I was wishing I wasn't so punctual.

I walked in to another guy in the process of freezing in the... cold tank. I looked at him and could feel the cold! His face was nearly white, and he was shivering uncontrollably, hardly able to speak. As I saw this situation taking place, I realized I was going to be that guy in about 30 minutes, and started to weigh the options...I figured I was a fast runner still and could probably jet out the door and run out of the Max Bell Center and into my car in 5 minutes flat, drive home and never go near that place again... Or I could be a man, stick it out, and make the $100.

I chose the latter. oops.

The assistant lady gave me a stack of papers, told me to read them and sign them. These things always make me nervous... "Why is there so much information I need to know before doing this" I thought. After reading the papers, I have to say running away was sounding very good.

But I am a man right... (insert manly grunt here) so I signed the papers, and got changed into my swim trunks.

The first thing they did was hook me up to what seemed like hundreds of electro-lites (not sure how to spell those) which give you shocks, and make your muscles contract. I'm a hairy bugger so I knew when he was putting these things on my chest, and near my armpits, I was in for some serious pain when the tape came off. As the guy leading the expiriment finished putting the wires on me, I heard the assistant lady say "I'm just gonna stick this tube down your throat." (that was my interpretation). "what?!" I said in a disbelief kind of way. She went on to explain that this was the most important part of equipment on me because it monitored my core body temperature...and seeing how the expiriment was supposed to drop my body temperature by 3C, I figured I needed it. But this tube thing, I don't wish it on anyone... It's one of those ones that goes in up your nose and goes down your asophogus (sp?) and just sits there. That's right just dangles in your body! She grabbed the tube, warmed the end and said "on the count of three I'm gonna stick this up your nose, and you're gonna swallow" (again, what I heard, it was more scientific sounding). 1, 2,...holy #*@! what just happened! Folks, I now know what cruel and unusual punishment is.

This frikin' tube was absolutely irritating me the whole time. I just couldn't get used to it, even though they kept saying I would forget it was there.

*Just a funny little side thing that happened here at this point...* At about this time, the leader of this expiriment was asking me some questions, just getting some small talk out of the way. And he asked me what I did. This question is always funny for me because I figure nobody EVER guesses that I am a pastor. So as I told him, "Actually, I'm a worship pastor at a church" his response was priceless..."Get the f*ck outta here!" (in a surprised, not mad way) "Oh sh*t, sorry... I mean, sorry." So, clearly, my assumption that no one ever would think I work at a church is right. but, Oh, how I love these moments.

Anyway, after they had me all hooked up, and had me now walking like C-3PO, I was ready to do preliminary biscept testing... The only uncomfortable part of this is the electro-lites. They have to find out the maximum shock they can give you in order to really get your muscles to contract. Again, cruel and unusual punishment. I don't like hearing, "alright, we're gonna raise this up to 250 (giga-whatevers) in shock now" after you had felt like your biscept was going to explode out of your skin after the last one!

After all the preliminary testing, it was now time to die...

Yes, this is the part where I was strapped into a harness, lifted above the floor, and slowly dropped into a tank about the size of a bathtub (but much deeper) with water that was cold enough to drop my body temperature 3C, making it 34C...Actually that sentence isn't entirely true...the water wasn't totally freezing yet. they have some sort of grace and start you out in water that is about 20C, which if you have ever been in water that temperature, it's still dang cold! But I was in there and thinking I was tough, thinking "man, this is all you got, I could sit in here, get used to this water, and have a good ole' time." About that time I had that thought, death came riding on the shoulders of the Masters student in the form of 6 monster bags of ICE. Yeah, he plunked them on the ground, and proceeded to dump ALL 6 bags into my little coffin of water.

At this point I was thinking I should've taken that extra shift at Starbucks.

The bags of ice wasn't the end though...oh far from it! Next came the tub jets...You know how nice it is when you're sitting in a HOT tub, and you have the soothing consistency of jets behind your back...well I had a variation of that. I had jets blowing on both sides of my body, but these had none other but freezing cold water coming out of them.

Lord save me.

The next part of this story is called "Shivering." No I'm not talking about the little shiver you get when you see something that is deeply moving, or the type you get when there is a slight chill in the air...I'm talking about all out uncontrollable shaking! I was a disaster...It's like you want to control your body, but it controls you! You can't stop the shaking because your body is doing it to keep you warm, and your body does not find it normal to be in, get this now, 7C water! That's right, the water had plummeted to 7C. to the lay person, that is TOO dang close to pure ice.

So here I am, I had been sitting in this tank for 20 minutes, shaking to keep myself alive, and then I have this awful realization...
"I have to take a leak" I thought. I mean, I really had to take a leak...

As best I could I called the expiriment guy over and told him my plight. I asked him if I would have time to go to the can after I got out of the cold tank before we did the muscle testing...he said no, because it would skew the results as my body would have a chance to warm up. Then he said some of the most horrifying words I had heard in a long time..."You know, this might sound really wierd, but... you're just gonna have to go in the tank."

Eloi, Eloi, Lama Sabacthani.

I was mortified! Here I am freezing my ace off, with a tube dangling in my asophogus, freezing, with wires strapped to me, did I mention freezing, having to take a leak...but having to just let nature take its course in my swim trunks!

Again I was at a crossroads. I could either set the world record for holding it when you feel like your gonna explode you have to go so bad, or I could sit in this cold tank and take a wizzle in my shorts...

Again... I chose the latter.

Oh how good it felt though.

The guy came back, looked at a guage and said, "you raised the damn temperature of the water!" and threw in 3 more bags of ice.

I thought I was a good person?!

This next part of the story is called "I think the Lord is calling me home now." After the slight distraction that was me taking a pee pee in the cold tank, I realized I was still in 7C water...When you're in the tank, you hold onto this board, it's called the "Gord Board" named after Professor Popsicle (Gordon Giesbrecht). I was now holding on for dear life, because I felt that if I let go, I would go home to be with my Lord and Saviour. Unforunately for me at that point in time, it was not my time to go...It was still my time to freeze my can off.

I sat in that tank of 7C water for 1 hour people...1 hour! Yeah, I'm not sure how that worked out either, but I'm here writing this now so I must be semi-o.k.

I was lifted out of that tank, and I looked about as red and pink as I think a human body could ever get... Oh the burn!

After I regained normal consciousness again, they make you go through tests of muscular strength that make you feel like a wimpy little girl because you can barely flex your muscles.

This next part of the story is a happy part. It's where you get to sit in HOT water until you get your body temperature back to 37C. Oh how sweet that was...

Finally, after a grueling 4.5 hours, it was over...almost.

The last part was to take off all the wires and equipment hooked up to you by tape.

Remember before how I said I was a hairy bugger...yeah, that's where this comes into play.

This part of the story is called "free wax job." enough said.

The last part of the story is called "taking out that dreaded tube in my body." Remember how I had said I was feeling discomfort with it the whole time, and just couldn't stop thinking about it...well, when he counted to three and I breathed in, and he pulled the tube up out of my asophogus, through my nose and out, I saw why it was uncomfortable. The freaking thing was bent in half! So everytime I would swallow, my throat muscles had that much more to get caught on, and I was basically fighting not eating the stupid tube the whole time!

Now if by chance you are reading this, and by chance you made it this far, you may be wondering a simple question, why? Why did I do this? well the answer is simple, I am part of an event in May that forces us to do some fundraising...

yeah, I dislike fundraising that much. that is why.

All in all, it was really quite a miserable experience, but dang it, I got a seriously good story out of it...and you know what, that's worthy taking a pee pee in the cold tank.

lovin' it...

so you can never know what kind of weather you are going to get in April in Winnipeg...but this is such a beauty surprise! Another awesome day outside. Got to play some street hockey (and realize how out of shape I am), got to eat some hamburger helper with the bruce, am listening to some good tunes, a good cup of coffee... life's good isn't it? I just gotta remember that on the more not-so-good days.
I thank God for these blessings and more...I pray my life would reflect his goodness.

another day older and what do you get...

so I celebrated another birthday on the 17th of this month...

I've been realizing some things about getting older. First off, you start reflecting more on where you've been, where you've come to, and how you've got there. This is a good thing, as long as your past is kept in balance with your future. In other words, as long as your past is big enough to see, but not so big that it obstructs your view of the future...Like my good buddy Randall Holm (a professor at Providence College) says, "it's kind of like your rear view mirror in your car." You need it, but it can't be your whole view.

the other thing I realized is that the older you get, the more you see situations repeat themselves. You see history do a...well... do-over, in some senses. As a child who has touched a burning hot stove element knows the outcome of doing it again, so I now know certain outcomes of certain situations in life that inevitably come up over and over again. You can't always stay away from the burning hot element in life, and as you get older, you start to know how to interact with it...perhaps even use it for good (if that makes any sense). Hopefully, with that knowledge or wisdom, you can have a better idea of how to act and react in those situations because you continue to gain what they call "wisdom of years."

one of the last things that I know is that I really know nothing in the scope of all there is to know... it's funny because I think of the things I know now as compared to three years ago, heck, even a year ago, and I'm amazed...so I think, it will be unreal how much more I'll know 2o years down the road...but what really astounds me is the fact that even then, even by the end of my life, what I know is so, so, SO, minuscule in comparison to all there is to know.

Thankfully, in life, it's not all about what you know...it's also about who you know.

another school shooting...

sometimes I really dislike having a newspage as my home site when I turn on the internet...

today is one of those days.

In Virginia today, at a community college, at least 22 people (possibly more) have been shot dead in the case of another deadly school shooting (according to the CBC). As I read it, I couldn't help but enter into that horrific spot, that place of hearing gunshots resonate through the building, 30 to 40 times...the sound of screaming...it's all too graphic for me, and nearly brings me to tears.

What's going on in our minds these days? That's where it starts.

I pray for these families that had to wake up this morning to a phone call, or a police officer, or, worse yet, the news, telling them their child (or husband or wife or father or mother or daughter or brother)... has been murdered.

It's times like these that the thought of having no God, having no order, is far scarier than having a God who seems to "let these things happen."

so I was wrong...

apparently wireless internet has made it's way to the middle of a forest, in poe-dunk Manitoba! Yeah, I'm at Red Rock bible camp in the middle of the Whiteshell, and yeah, I'm blogging...

I'm not sure whether that's cool, or incredibly sad...I think I'm leaning toward the latter.

Anyway, I was wrong because I said I wasn't going to write a post until Sunday...but, seeing as how I can write something now...I don't have to write on sunday. right?!

It's going well out here, the kids are real fun...funny kids too. I think it is going to be a great weekend. Looking forward to the events that will shake down.

from the middle of a forest, beside a lake, under a clear starry sky...
-cody.

goin' back to hikes school...

well, I'm off in about 2 hours from now...to help out with a youth retreat that my friend Allan Mailloux (pronounced "May-you" but I like to pronounce it "May-locks") is putting on.

I woke up this morning just pumped...because I was going to a retreat again! It was like I went back to high school, and I was ready to have a blast with a bunch of good folks at a cool place.

I will be gone until sunday. I'm real excited to see where God takes us to this weekend.

Hopefully, I will be back in one piece to write again here on Sunday night, filling in the details.

Until then...

riding season...

so I'm loving the warmer weather, and it's so nice to have the sunshine out longer than 2 hours a day!

It's really making me itch to get out on my motorcycle and start riding...

Yet it doesn't want to start, and for the life of me I have no idea why.

ticks me off.

I suppose there ar greater trajedies in life...
not many though.

had to cheer myself up...

after writing that depressing last posting...I needed something to cheer me up

this baby totally makes my day! So funny, my gut hurt after watching it I was laughing so hard.

watch.

hard days for Canada...

I was saddened as I read the breaking news just recently that another 2 soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan...

You know, it seemed for a long time that that kind of news was only about the militia from our neighbors to the south. Well, it's about us now. It's wierd to read about suicide car bombers that are targeting Canadian vehicles there... yeah, the country that is supposed to be friends with "everyone" is now being targeted in Afghanistan by suicide bombers! I know it's naive to think that this is the first time Canada has been targeted...and I don't think that...but it is still unusual to read.

but more than that it is sad. I'm still struggling with the fact that these Canadian soldiers, some of them still kids really, are being killed out there, for...?

The last few days have been hard ones for Canada...

What starbucks has taught me about the end times...

So, in my few months at the Starbucks on Corydon I have learned a lot of things...For example, I know how to make all kinds of Latte's, Cappuccino's (but don't know how to spell it), and these things called Frappaccino's.

But today...today, I got to learn a very special lesson. Yes, today the lesson was on the end times.

A lady came in to order her drink. Because I was on bar, how it works is the person at the till calls the drink out to me, and I, in turn, call it back and proceed to make it. This lady had asked for a latte, with 2 sweetners...i.e. 2 "splendas" for someone that knows we only carry those on bar. So there I go, making the drink with accurate precision, making sure that it is done very well.

What happens next is that you put the drink on the bar and call out "I have a Grande, Non-Fat, 2 splenda, Extra Hot, Latte."

I handed her the drink, and was going to go do something else, and I looked over and there was a kind of a horrified look on her face... "You put splenda in here?..." "I asked for sweet and low" (which she didn't because she said "sweetner," which last time I checked, wasn't code word for "Sweet and Low..." "Sweetner" could be anything, it could be Syrup for crying out loud!) Anyway, I went on a rant there... She pushed the drink back towards me, and I knew what she wanted. She wanted me to re-do the ENTIRE drink because of a few grains of sweetner! To her, the end times had come, and she needed her saviour that was "Sweet and low!"

Everything in me screamed that this kind of pickiness was wrong...yet I was caught in this battle of thought, because yes, she did pay almost $5 for that drink, and it should be done right...but come on! 2 Sweetners, and you've gotta throw away a whole drink. Am I being unfair in my estimations here?

so, therefore, my conclusion is that we are far too spoiled, and we need to chill out a little bit (maybe a lot) over the little things... because after all, it's not the end of the world.

Interactive blog #1

thanks Chantelle! -cody.

hmm...an interactive blog, hey? I'll give it a go...even though I didn;t make it to church this easter, God still has a way of teaching me when I least expect it. I'm kinda stuck on fiddler on the roof right now (mostly because I stumbled upon a dvd of it this weekend, and I almost forgot how amazing that movie is!) but at the very beginning, there is a line that caught my attention... the narrator says something about how tradition keeps us balanced and without tradition, our lives would be as shaky as a "fiddler on a roof" but oddly enough the theme of the movie has more to do with change than with tradition. anyway I better get to the point here or else I'll just end up ranting about this movie forever (because I really liked it...haha) it got me thinking lots about tradition and change, and how faith can sometimes seem so stuck in the middle of both, and how it sometimes helps makes it easier to accept and even understand why change happens and tradition sticks around.anyways, thats just a tiny piece of what has been going through my mind...and I'm excited because I feel like God is going to go somewhere with this..like He's gonna teach me something here. anyways, thats all for now. ~Chantelle (wow..getting all this out of my head and into a more concrete form helps to sort out thoughts, regardless if they make sense to anyone else or not)

Refinding our rhythm...

so, I figured I should write today in case any of you follow this and take anything I say into consideration... I didn't want you to think that dead Jesus was still dead.

Quite the contrary. As we sais in our church today, "He is risen!"
He is risen indeed...

what has caught me this easter season is a phrase that my brother conjured up while thinking about the events of this week that happened over 2000 years ago. The charge is: "Refinding our rhythm..." I thought it was a genius thought. It brought everything together in my mind this year.

It was as if when I heard the phrase "refind your rhythm," it was like God was shouting to me, "remember who you are!" It begged me to come back to my roots; that is a stripped down person who is only secure in relation to my relationship with my creator. It was so fresh to be brought back to my creator, my saviour, this easter. I thank God for what he has taught me in this very special time of year.

so I don't know if this is against blogging etiquette or what...but if you comment on this, (if you feel comfortable), share with me what you've been learning over this easter time... what has/does this season meant/mean to you? Please share, and if there's enough feedback, I'll post it all on my next blog.

thanks.

dead Jesus...

so tonight, for maundy thursday, we went to experience artwork by local artist Christian Worthington (at his beauty loft in downtown Winnipeg) to prepare us for this weekend's significance.

The art he does is incredible. There was one specific painting that haunted most people that looked at it. It was a huge painting of Jesus, lying on a stone table... dead. I know it almost seems wrong to say that, but it is what it is. I kept coming back to that painting, I was drawn to it. Most people were avoiding it, or couldn't look at it long. But it had the most significant effect on me. I think I know why...

It gave me the most raw, clear, and vivid picture of Jesus' humanity. It gave me a blunt realization that Jesus actually died. He was dead...not just play dead...he was lying on a stone table, dead...separated from God, for three days. This picture, so clear in this painting, gave me such an appreciation for our Great High Priest who knows our weaknesses and can identify with our pain, because he went through it all himself...even death, for real.

Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.

-20C camping

yeah, it's true. gavin, gerry, erik, del, and myself decided to take an 18 hour excursion out in the vastness that is no more than half an hour east of Winnipeg.

We took this crazy dirt road into where we stayed yesterday. Because the sun was bright and warm, the dirt was more like mud, and I just about wet my pants laughing because Erik was driving "goldie locks" (my rear wheel drive 1982 Volvo 240 GL) through these ruts that seemed higher than the car itself. Gerry and I were in his truck barely able to stay on the road ourselves because we were laughing so hard...I suppose I won't be laughing now when I have to get (what will seem like millions of $ in) front end work on the old girl. oh well, it's so worth it to laugh that hard.

we found a beauty spot, nestled in between two ponds, with a hill (more like a mound of dirt) that gave us shelter from the cold wind. we set up our tents and proceeded to settle in for the rest of the evening by the fire...

why is it that when we're out in places like that, life just seems right. It seems like it is close to the way God intended for life to be...perhaps a little more simple.

All in all, it was much needed. I thank the Lord for times like those in good places with great folks.

holiday...

clam chowder...oregon coast...golf...nachos...golf...family...golf...portland...more golf...salt water taffy...jimbo's...logie...rabboni...kia minivan?
well to those that know me, those words will mean something...and for those of you that don't know me, i'm not crazy.
I was on vacation, and I guess managed to vacation from writing here also. It was a beauty time away but it is good to be back home, and back into "blogdom" as my friend Randall calls it.
more later when I'm not on cold and flu drugs!
oh yeah, one more thing: drinking henry weinhards (sp?) rootbeer (which is delectable!) while you're driving in a van that doesn't have licence plates is not a good idea. that's what I learned this trip.