Best of Five

Krista and I have listened through Mark Driscoll's sermon's on marriage recently and now we're listening to them again with our community group. The second sermon in the series is all about being friends and so I thought I'd share how my wife and I have been using gaming to be friends. If you've never listened to the sermons, you should, but specifically the one titled "Friend with Benefits."

Back in the fall, while in the midst of playing through every board game in my collection, I asked Krista if she'd like to do a Best of Five series for a particular game. I was really being burnt out on playing a game once, then not playing it again for another year, and wanted a chance to play them more and get to learn the game more. So we began playing games, first person to 3 wins takes the series, and then the loser selects the next game in the series. This has been a great way for us to be friends, as we have some competition and fun to look forward to in an evening, and at the same time get better at our games.

I realize that this is more "shoulder to shoulder" friendship, which lines up with my friendship style more than Krista's, but at the same time it is good for us to spend time just the two of us and interacting, in this case over a game, rather than just sitting and watching a movie or reading in the same room together.

As for the games that we've played, we just finished our 15th series, which has included 14 unique games. We played Castles of Burgundy twice. The only game that we'd not suggest as a two-player game anymore, after playing it 5 times, is Tobago. It's an okay two player game, but really shines more with 3 or 4 players. I'm looking forward to our series continuing, though I'm currently on top, so Krista gets to pick the next game.

I'll leave you with a quick list of the games we've played (feel free to guess who won what series), which you might enjoy with your spouse or kids in a one on one situation, and also a quick fact about my wonderful wife who is my friend. Krista is really particular (read anal here) about how the frosting is spread on cinnamon rolls. I love her for that.

The Games (You'll notice, these names tend to be places in the world, which is weird):
The Castles of Burgundy
Agricola
Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries
Jaipur
Macao
Carcassonne
Warhammer: Invasion
Sid Meier's Civilization (2010)
Traders of Carthage
Le Havre
Santiago de Cuba
Dominion
Tobago
San Juan

Jesus and March Madness

So I have had a blog half written for several weeks now, but can't seem to finish it.  It's about how much of the future did Christ know. This whole thought process came about when I was enjoying some BW3's hamburgers and watching March Madness with some friends. At first, I thought I could do it justice in a written blog, but after doing more and more research I'm not sure I can. I'm not some huge systematic theology professor that can analyze ever angle of it and write with the expression and precision that is needed to breach such a subject. Maybe someday that blog will be written, but for now it'll remain as a draft on my computer, until I can bring it the full research I need to do.

However, I still did want to write about Jesus and knowing the future. I've been reading in the gospels recently and see many times where Christ really does know the future. I'm not going to approach whether or not he knew while he was on Earth that Adam Daulton would be born in 1983 or that I would eat Lucky Charms and drink a Chai Tea this morning, but I do want to point out he knew what was coming for himself and what he had to face.

Let's take just one example from scripture in Mark 8:31, "And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again." Jesus was teaching the disciples about what had to happen, he would be rejected by the spiritual leaders of the day, a pretty big thing for a Jew whose religion is so tied up into his ethnicity, and then be killed! He knew that he would suffer, he even asked the Lord for a different way in Gethsemane to go about saving the world. He knew that a sacrifice had to be made, in order for you and I to have the opportunity to be saved, and not only did he know that, but he had the choice to not go through with it. The good news is this though, he knew he would conquer death, he would rise again, and thus defeating death allow us that same opportunity of a new life in him!

So, Christ did exactly what he knew had to be done, and at the same time, he did exactly what he knew would be done. Did Jesus know that March Madness 2012 would happen? I still am not sure one way or the other. However, I'm glad that question came up on that Friday afternoon. It's given me a lot to think about. Sometimes our lunch conversations are stupid and ridiculous, but sometimes they are deep and important. Now to begin work on my presentation about marshmallows and their role in the Spanish Inquisition....

GeoCaching!

I've got a new hobby. I hear you already, "Another hobby, Adam?! You already have a gazillion." You are correct in thinking that I have a gazillion hobbies, after all throughout the years I've golfed, played paintball, collected stamps, the 4 major sports cards, pogs, Louis L'Amour books, enjoy LotR, reading, basketball, fishing, hunting, board games, movies, even this blogging thing. Now we can add one more to the list: geocaching.

Randy, my father in law, has been doing it for several years and I've gone out with him about half a dozen times over that time to find these caches. He would go online to www.geocaching.com  and print off the different caches close by, would enter the coordinates into his GPS device, and then we'd go find them. Seemed like a lot of work for me to do all that, but now that I have an iPhone I'm set. I just be sitting on the picnic table and decide I want to find a geocache and look up the closest one and find it. Just like that, no printing, no entering coordinates, just finding the cache which is the best part. I then can take a note, log that I found it, put a picture up, all from my phone. So this hobby can be a hobby of mine that I can do anywhere and anytime that doesn't take a lot of pre-planning to carry out. I can have fun adventures with whoever I'm with.

What is a geocache you ask? It can be a lot of things, but most commonly it is a small container that contains a log book for you to sign your name and the date you found it. Also, if the container is big enough, you can "trade" items with the other geocachers that find it. These items can be just about anything, a book, a penny, a couple dice, old toys, even numbered coins and tags so you can follow the item one it's trip around the world!

So far, with the help of others, I've discovered 17 different caches here in central Indiana. I'm going to St. Louis in May and Kansas City in June, so I'm hoping to be able to find more out there as well. It's been fun getting to learn the jargon of the hobby and taking my family and friends out on the adventures to find the items. So far I've have 2 caches that are my favorite. One is in Fort Ben Harrison State Park and right next to Fall Creek in an old Army ammo container. It's a real quiet spot, with a nice view, and you have to cross the creek to get to it. The other was in some boulders in Shelby County, though I liked it more I think because I took Kaylee, Nathan, and Landon out to find that one and they had a blast. So, if you have a smart phone, I suggest you look at goecaching, create and account, and have some adventures!

Here are a couple pictures from the geocaching I did over Easter Weekend with the kids holding up the thigns they found: