so for the past two nights, I have been in charge of setting up lights and running the light board for a one-man show at church. Doug Brummel, a catholic comedian/family values speaker/entertainer. I highly recommend seeing his show, I mean going out of your way to see him if you hear about his show, if you're catholic or religious enough and close (a lot of his jokes and songs are "insider" jokes and songs that we would mostly recognize, but a lot of the ideas would apply to other christian denominations). Anyway, I had 6 floods on 2 sliders, and 2 spots on 1 slider (they had set it up on 2, but I moved plugs, because I never had only one or the other). It was very easy, the spots were duck-taped to the front pews, and the floods were clipped to dowel (sp?) rods, which were sitting on the floor in front of the first pews. but I still had to adjust them and run them. He complimented me on the fact that the lights were seamless enough that his attention was never drawn to them, so he was never thrown off. I don't think he would have been thrown off anyway, since at one point, the house lights came on when they weren't supposed to, and he stopped in mid-sentence and said, "well, that's strange. Let's pray to Mary that the lights go back off, shall we?" and proceeded to pray to mary that the lights go off until they went off again. [laughs] Anyway, I also had to hook up the sound tonight, or attempt to, meaning plug things in, unplug other things, and try to make them work. In the end, he had to come turn it on, since I had missed a cord that needed to be plugged in, and a power switch that was labeled strangely and did not make any sign that it was on or off. [grins and shrugs] but my lights were great. and so is cold pizza. mmmmm.

oh, and before I forget, wish my godson, Malachy, a happy 1-year-old birthday. (it's been his birthday for half an hour now). (Technically, he's a Charles, but his dad and granddad are Charles, so his dad decided to give him a middle name he liked and call him by it, rather than make him a Charles III). He's adorable and didn't learn to cry until about 8 or 9 months old, at which point he whines instead of crying. He's developing very well both motor skills and communication skills, and he already likes electronics and video games as much as his father [laughs]. I mean, he doesn't know what the buttons do, he just likes to push them. Especially power buttons. They get him more attention. [grins] But anyone of the praying-for-things persuasion, pray that he doesn't grow up with bitterness or emotional problems or anything. His parents separated, after only 3 years of marriage, for reasons that I'm not going to go into but that I'm positive no amount of help will overcome. So far, they're both excellent parents, jointly taking good care of him, not fighting over him or shirking their duties as parents or setting an example of being unhappy all the time, but happiness without morality isn't the best example he could, and should, get. But, his father being against organized religion for the most part, and his mother being neutral but against catholicism in particular (though not catholics in general), it is difficult for me to teach him about morality. I mean, he's only a year old, so right now he wouldn't be much different, and so it doesn't continually grate on me, but eventually it's going to be something important. ah, enough. it's his birthday. yay! I need to go buy him a bible. [laughs]