Month: March 2007

Missionary Talks 20: Garvin Dykes

Garvin Dykes is a friend of ours whom we met while still in our previous ministry at the Bill Rice Ranch. When we left the Ranch and started looking for information about having our church act as our “missions agency” we turned to Bro. Garvin for advice. He helped us tremendously and, over time, we decided to use Baptist International Outreach as a clearing house for our funds and legal paperwork (in missionary speak that means they keep us out of trouble with the IRS).

We knew several weeks back that Bro. Dykes would be in the area and also knew that we were going to get to have a meal with him. What we did not know is that we were able to snatch him away from his other responsibilities for a few hours.

I dragged him off to a coffee shop and recorded this interview…I won’t make that mistake again! What a horrible noisy place. I got them to turn down the music after we had been recording for a little bit, but the first part is still quite noisy. After we finished up the interview we stepped outside and it was so nice and quiet out there. Had we set up our interview out there we would only have had road noise to deal with on occasion. The music was blasting the whole time inside.

I wanted to do the interview in a place that had some background noise. Doing any recording during the day at my house is sketchy. It is hard to keep things quiet with all the outside noise and 2 kids. By recording in a “sound rich” environment, I figured it would be easier to excuse the occasional noise. I got well more than I bargained for.

Check out the show. Let me know what you think. As far as interesting content, this is one of the best episodes in my opinion. We did not talk about him or his ministry. We talked about a three month trip to Africa and what he was able to do there.

Carrera de los Amigos

Today I got to run a 10K (6.2 miles) race that I ran last year. Last year it was my first 10K race. I have run a few since then. But this was the first time to run a race the second year in a row. I have been running about 14 months, so I am just now starting into my second year.

The start location was changed a bit this year and we left the starting area through a new location. I assumed that this was to make the course a bit longer. It was slated as a 10K, but was actually a 9.2K last year. But as we got close to the turn around spot, I realized they had shortened the course on the other end. Though this year’s race was a bit longer, it was not much longer. Only 9.5 Km.

I am not sure where I got the information for the race, but I had the starting time written down as 7:30. I got there at 6:57 planning to sign up and take a warm up jog. After my warm up jog, I would return to my car to drop off my iPod and drink some Gatorade.

But, to my surprise, people were lined up at the starting line. I ran to the table to register and asked the registration lady when the race started. She told me 7:00. Yikes! No returning to the car. I was still working on getting my number pinned on when they started making the “Get Ready, Set….” announcements. That also meant no warm up time.

I took the start of the race really slow. I figured I could make a nice slow warm up and then run strong at the end. I ran at a pace of 10:26 per mile to the turn around and then 9:43 coming back. I sped up considerably, but I could have done better. I did not turn on my brain until I was 6 Km. into the run.

There was a lady ahead of me the whole race who I used as a pace setter. When I finally got my brain in gear, I started working to overtake her. It took a while, but I was able to do it with about 1/2 Km. left in the run. I passed several other people at the end as well.

I could have run faster had I been thinking about the distance and the fact that it really was a race. Because I did not get a chance to warm up I really treated it as just a regular weekly run. I wanted to really blow away my time from last year. I actually ran 2 seconds slower per mile as my overall pace from last year.

I did learn something this morning though. There was also a walk that coincided with the race. I have been involved with several races like this. The walk is shorter than the run and you have walkers coming back across the finish line at the same time as the runners. There were several walkers that I saw who were spraying water on each other or generally goofing around. In the process they were jumping back and forth causing runners to have to avoid them and throwing runners off their strides. Runners who were pretty worn out by this time. I learned to give them wide berth and try to avoid running near the walkers. Plus they line up 4 or 5 wide and take up the whole lane on the road that is designated for the race causing the runners who want to pass to have to veer out into traffic. Not good. Avoid walkers at all costs.

I am not saying they should not be there. They are at least getting out and getting some exercise. But, I know they won’t be considerate of me, so I must watch out for myself.

Even with the frustration of arriving really late, I had a good run. I just wished I was more in the right mindset to have made it a record run for that course.

Bread Maker

I was reading a thread over at the Fitness Rocks forum where they are discussing making your own bread. One of the participants said that the thread prompted them to go out and buy a bread maker. That caused me to remember our first bread maker we bought.

In the fall of 1998 we were working in a church in Nashua New Hampshire. One day we were out and saw an odd store called Building #19 in one of the nearby towns. Being the consummate bargain hunters that we are, when we saw the tag line “Good Stuff Cheap!” we had to check it out. Browsing the store (I think it was the old location in Manchester) we came across a bread maker for $5. We did not have much money in those days, but $5 was worth taking a risk on. Bread makers were selling at the time for well over $100. I forget which brand that one was, but it was a known brand.

I have a bit of skill with electronics and thought that if it was something simple that I could fix, then it would be worth the risk. Even if it cost $25-50 in parts, I could take the chance. So we snatched it up.

We were staying in a lady’s house who was very kind. She allowed us to test our bread maker right then, even knowing that the risk was that it would blow up and burn down the house. It worked perfectly. We used it for 6 years before selling it to move to Mexico. We had to scale back our amount of stuff we could stuff in the Suburban.

We were not without a bread maker long. Another family here had one that they were not using, so they passed it on to us.

We have had 2 bread makers in 10 years at the cost of $5. I wonder how much the Fitness Rocks forum member paid for his?

Now we just have to use it more often.

Did well at chess tournament

My son did a great job at a chess tournament this week that ended tonight. There were 5 rounds. His opponent did not show up for the first round. So he won a point. He was a little bummed that “it was not a real point” since he did not actually play. But, when you consider he outsmarted his opponent just by showing up, I would say he was the better player. [1 point]

Second round ended oddly. The round started 25 minutes late. How strange! Because he knew when the third round was supposed to start, he did not feel they had enough time to play out the whole game. When it got close to time that the third round would be underway, he offered a draw and his opponent accepted. My son did not realize that because round 2 started late that round 3 would start late as well. That is just the way a 9 year old mind works. I have beat into him that when someone says they will be there or start at a certain time and then don’t, that is being disrespectful and lying to the other person. So he expects others to start when they say they will. [1/2 point]

Round 3 he won. Not handily. It took some work, but he did it. [1 point]

Round 4 was a handy win. Quick and to the point. [1 point]

Round 5 did not go so well. He got off to a poor start and had trouble recovering. [0 point]

Total of 3 1/2 points out of a possible 5. I think he ended up in the top 5 players. There were 50 something contestants in his category. He played against kids in 4th through 6th grades. He is in 4th. We should get the final standings tomorrow.

No podcast this week

Wow, only 3 weeks into the new podcast and I miss a week. Well, as you will find out, this podcast is for fun and not high on the priority list.

I have recorded it twice and both had serious problems. Too serious to overcome. The first was due to my recording location and the second was user error. Brought on by not taking 10 seconds to check some settings.

The first recording was done at a park where I was able to get some great ambient noise to go into the background of the recording. The problem was that there was quite a bit of wind going on that day. I hunkered down in a recessed spot in the park and then hunched over the microphone. There was still a bit of wind noise, but not as bad as it would have been otherwise. But, this body position had the result of me sounding like I was on my deathbed. There was no energy. One of the best positions to be in while recording if you want energy is standing or walking around. The worst? Hunched over the mic while sitting in a hole at the park.

I blew the second recording because I did not listen to the input before committing 20 minutes of microphone time. I had my levels set on my recorder for another project and I ended up overpowering the mic. That means that all the sounds from the car (I was driving at the time) are not just heard well, but so loud that that is about all you can hear. My voice going into the mic caused the recorder to almost completely drop out because I was too loud.

*Sigh*

Well, you can at least read about everything I was saying. I will just put off the podcast promo I was going to do until then. I will try to hit it fresh this time. Maybe I can record in the park again without the wind, or I will be here in the studio. I will get something out.