Our refrigerator door

Our refrigerator here is built into the cabinets so you can’t use magnets to post things up on it. So the closest replacement we have is our website. So here is Alex’s latest drawing (he does at least one drawing a day in Kindergarten here). This one is of the Easter Bunny which is suppose to be coming by the kindergarten soon. I think he’s really excited about the chocolate that the Easter Bunny brings because the chocolate here is really (and I mean really) good.

Its funny, but he hasn’t really put together the association of the Easter Bunny and Easter. He still looks to Easter as the time when Jesus Christ rose from the dead and in doing so, made it so that we can be friends with God again. I’m not one to change my child’s mind about that.

Endings the way they should be

There are some movies that you walk out of and just think, “Why did they end it that way?” Well, now there is a website making the difference and redoing the endings. For me, one of the movies was Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man’s Chest. So go check out the new ending as it really should have been here

Top Ten Things Learned as a Professional Developer

Andres Taylor at Andre’s Thoughts has put together a good “Top Ten” list of things he has learned as a developer that resounded in my chest when I read them. They are so true. Here is the abbreviated list (with my comments):

1. Object orientation is much harder than you think – I remember learning programming in college only for them to tell me that the programming world was switching to OO, but they didn’t know what it was to be able to teach us.
2. The difficult part of software development is communication – Software development is a team adventure. Its not just the programmer manipulating 1′s and 0′s.
3. Learn to say no – True, so true. As with any job where you are the one that “makes it happen”. You have to be able to say “no”.
4. If everything is equally important, then nothing is important – I am always saying to project managers, bosses, customers – “What do you want done first?” If they say “Everything”, then my response is usally something like “I’m going to get some food since everything is of equal importance but food seems to have greater importance for me”
5. Don’t over-think a problem – I have spent two days working on an issue only to have my son (who is now 6 yrs old) say something really simple that shows me the solution.
6. Dive really deep into something, but don’t get hung up – I know a little of a lot but not a lot of a little.
7. Learn about the other parts of the software development machine – For me, I have always thought I was blessed to have first been in the business anaylst/project manager area before being a developer as it doest give me a different perspective when looking at the “Big Picture”
8. Your colleagues are your best teachers – One of the hardest times I had was when I was the only developer at a particular location. That’s when online forums became by best friends.
9. It all comes down to working software – Enough said!!
10. Some people are &$%# – While I’m not one to say this outloud, it’s true.

To read Andres Taylor’s comments with this Top Ten, see his blog here

First Outing to a German Church & Greetings

- We made our first outing to the German church this morning. We understood a bit. It was on a familiar passage (the Woman at the Well) so that helped a lot. When we came out Alex said “Are we going to go back here next week?” I said, “What do you think?” He said “That’d be good”.

It was about an hour and a half service. (We were told that it usually lasts 2 hours) The music was hymns done with guitar and piano. We had hymnals to sing out of. The pastor preached, with PowerPoint, on John 4. From what we could tell he gave a very clear explanation of the gospel and was quite animated in his preaching.

Alex had a separate program beginning with all ages singing together then breaking up for individual classes. He told us they played some games and then did a craft using a cut out of Psalm 119. There was an American little girl in there who took him under her wing.

So all in all, a successful foray. There is a more “contemporary” church in another town a little further away, that we will eventually try as well.

- In Germany when you are walking down the street or enter a store you must greet people.

Here’s a funny thing we say here:

Everyone above 60 says Gruss Gott- “God’s greeting”
Everyone above 40 says Gut Morgan or Gutten Tag – “Good Morning” or “Good Day”
Everyone abov 30 says Morgan or Tag – “Morning” or “Day”
Everyone under 30 says “allo” – “Hello”

When you introduce yourself you say, “Ich heisse Roes” – My name (is) Roes… So I’m known as Frau Roes. Only good friends may call me Krista. Nobody goes by “Miss Krista”.

We know what to do

One of our favorite lines from the live action film “Curious George” is when the man with the yellow hat is pursuing those that have taken George and sees that they are getting away on a ship. He is in his car and says, “I’ve watched a lot of action films so I know exactly what to do”. Afterwhich he barrels down the hill in his car attempting to jump (unsuccessfully) onto the moving ship.

Being from North Carolina since before my teenage years began, I know exactly what to do when we see snow starting to fall from the sky: Go to the grocery store and buy bread and milk (which I never really understood as almost all the snow in North Carolina is melted within a day except for the mountains) and wonder when they will be announcing the closing of schools and businesses. But here is not North Carolina. They tend to do things differently. When it snows, it means people wake up a little bit earlier so that they can shovel not only their driveway but also the sidewalk (so that it is cleared for those that need to walk by your house). Then life goes on as usual. Being the only male in our apartment building, I decided I would go out and do the shoveling. I’m still feeling it in my muscles and back now. Why did we decide to live in a place that’s on the corner (hence two sides have sidewalks) and that owns an extra lot beside us (so that one side has a really long sidewalk)? Oh well, I needed the excercise.

Now that we are on day 4 of these beautiful snowflakes drifting down from heaven, its getting old. The irony is that if we go one town south or two towns west, it looks like its barely snowed there. The hills in our area have seemed to just trap the snow clouds so that they are hovering over our town and those towns deep in the Black Forest. We’ve enjoyed the snow (and snowball fights that have erupted when you have a 6 yr old boy).

I put up a few photos from our place in the Photo Album

The “Other” World

There is a place you can go through life without anyone knowing who you “really” are. You can do things that you would normally be totally scared to do as they could damage your reputation, ability to work, or even cause you physical harm. Social pressures to be a certain way or act in a particular way are removed. You have the freedom to create yourself in anyway you want and present yourself as any kind of person you want to be. What would you do? How would you act? What places would you go?

I am not speaking about a psychological experiment or even the Internet in general but about a place online called Second Life. This virtual world allows you to create yourself in any way you can imagine. So how are people “living” in this virtual world? Some are making life long friends who may (or may not) meet in the outside world. Others are living lives that they feel they can not in the “real” world. Moral and ethical values (and lack there of) have moved from the “real” world into this virtual reality. I’ve even read that Second Life recently had a “terrorist” attack.

But in this “world” where you can have total anonymity, there are people who are using this cover to seek out answers to the spiritual questions that they have. That’s why its so cool to hear about a church who has decided that this will be one of their mission fields and have “bought” 16 acres and “built” a church. LifeChurch.tv has spent quite a few hours developing a safe environment for people who are seeking answers to their questions and are searching for them in this world made of ones and zeros.

People who are in need of knowing God’s love are everywhere including the “virtual” worlds. If we are to reach the whole world, these places are to be included.

To know more about Second Life, see Wikipedia’s page
To know more about LifeChurch.tv’s virtual campus on Second Life, see their blog

A Safe Environment

The other day I was driving to German class when traffic caused me to stop. I was stopped a little bit longer than I had expected when all of the sudden I realized that there was a man at my window speaking rather loudly at me. I quickly determined that he was upset because I had stopped covering the crosswalk. He was speaking in German but I could tell he was telling me that I should have thought about where I stopped (I got this mainly because he was pointing to his head and had a face full of disgust.) I had flashbacks to my childhood where my dad would lecture me about how this was a world of thinkers and I must always be thinking. I got over that flashback though. Then I rolled down my window and purposely used the wrong words for “Excuse me” hoping that he would realize that I am a foreigner and that that might be some kind of excuse. It didn’t work. He ranted on even more. When I realized that in his vocalizing his concern about my driving, he was spitting on me. I decided to then roll up my window. Luckily, the traffic had moved on and so I decided it was time for us to do likewise. I looked in the rearview mirror to see him still standing there in the middle of the road mouthing words and making hand gestures (I don’t think they were vulgar gestures though, just more of a “I can’t believe he didn’t stay here to hear more of what I was saying” gestures).

This was not a time for me to practice my German. As the man clearly did not like the way I drove in his country, I do not believe he would have taken kindly to me butchering his language. Its hard to find the right places where its safe to practice German. You are looking to converse with someone who is understanding and forgiving. Who will gently correct you when you say something wrong. Who will help fill in the word gaps that you have when you are trying to say something. And above all they have to be patient and willing to take the time to have a conversation when speaking takes three or more times as long.

Then it dawned on me. We need a safe environment in which to learn German just as a new Christian needs a safe environment to learn what it means to be a follower of Christ. And the environments are the similar in nature. Just as we need to be able to speak with people who are willing to answer our questions (no matter how simple they may be) and with people that set a tone that any question can be asked. And the same thing holds true for a new Christian. We need people who have the patience to listen to us and help us fill the word gaps in our speech just as a new Christian does. We need someone who is going to show us grace when we mess up and in a nurturing way show us where in our text book (or other reliable literature) we have gone astray just as a new Christian, who is pursuing living a life as a Christ follower, needs people to surround them, encouraging them, and showing them grace when they mess up and in a loving way, show them where in our life’s manual (i.e. the Bible) they have gone astray.

Is your community of Christ followers a safe environment for a new Christian?