whatever

a whole month

2006-02-27T15:04:00.000-07:00

tomorrow marks the one month mark for unblogging by me. so i figured i'd beat the mark and post now. if other people can take a break for a month from blogging, then so can i. haha.

i've been incredibly swamped with life lately. all my classes have kept me busy with deadlines every night of the week. i can tell my semester will be a busy one. i started track too and so i dont get home until five everyday. and then two hours of homework each day at least puts me at 7:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. days everyday. then add in other things like church music which takes up around 8 hours a week mixed in and hanging out with my friends when i can which is quite important also. for those of you who know me well enough, you would know that i hate being busy and i value unscheduled time above any other way to spend time. so my life logically should be a living hell right now. but actually i cannot think of many other times that i've been happier and more content. God has given me a full plate and it feels like every time i step up and perform, im pleasing God. I think that spiritually i'll be growing a ton in the next few months. which is ironic because you would think that being busy would leave less time for God. definitely not. the less time i have, the more i use it to please God and the more valuable it is to me. I have had to start seeing God in all i do because it becomes so apparent that He's right there watching me. not like some creeper, obviously. God's not a creeper, thats not my point. My point is... actually i dont have a point. except i guess that living for God is what it sounds like: living life through and for God. because otherwise i'd be screwed. Living life purely for the sake of searching for happiness will bring nothing at all. forget about all the stuff you want and all the stuff you dont have. forget about how confusing girls are and how dumb guys are. forget about what hurts and start living. life should not be an event, it should be an action. one big action for God.

so i dont think many people will read this since everyone has probably forgotten that this blog exists. but whatever.

Psalm 66 and Proverbs

2006-01-28T15:41:00.000-07:00

Shout with joy to God, all the earth!
Sing the glory of His name; make His praise glorious!
Say to God, "how awesome are Your deeds! So great is your power that Your enemies cringe before You. All the earth bows down to You; they sing praise to You, they sing praise to Your name."

To man belong the plans of the heart, but from the Lord comes the reply of the tongue.

In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.

edit*
"The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised."

2006-01-24T18:01:00.000-07:00

"If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me."

How does one take up a cross daily? that doesnt sound very easy to me. in fact it sounds quite painful. and thats exactly the point. if our spiritual lives are easy then we have not denied ourselves. we cant just do it once a week on Sunday. there is a key word in this sentence: DAILY. every day we're supposed to wake up and serve God. its not a part-time job. its a 24-7 job. its our identity. wow. thats a tall order. "I can do everything through Him who gives me strength." through Him. thats why we must deny ourselves. daily.

A sonnet for the Broncos loss

2006-01-22T17:12:00.000-07:00

i had to write a sonnet for english. im not actually a freak. but it turned out good and the broncos' loss was my inspiration. so here it is.

Struck down are dreams of glory now in pain

Once cherished in the west but now has died

The efforts crushed and now will faint in vain

And no more lives the glory like a tide

To rise to fame and bask in all again

And overtake the sand and wash the toes

Of friends who bleed and watch for them to fend

But back the tide does fall with ghastly blows

And all the friends whose creeks true and just

Flow not into the tide where needed but

Go dry because the enemy does thrust

A sword into the heart where they do cut

Oh woe to us in this where life has turned

The tide does fall and all our hopes are burned

tear. someone hold me.

Poor Connor

2006-01-20T16:52:00.000-07:00

as you know, connor's stuff got stolen in costa rica. among the stolen items was his credit card. so he decided to cancel the account, to which his blog account was connected. soooooooooo, if you want to read his blog, too bad. its gone. dead. deceased. in turmoil. not here. sorry. wasnt that a great post especially after my little posting drought? yes i thought so too.

SWEEEEEEEEEEET

2005-12-24T17:30:00.000-07:00

BRONCOS FIRST ROUND BYE AND NUMBER 2 SEED IN THE POST SEASON!!!!!!!!!!!

HURR WE COME SAN DIEGO.

oh boy. thats exciting.

ok a real post. finally

2005-12-20T20:41:00.000-07:00

sorry it has been awhile since i've done a real post. sorry everyone. oh well. so today i was in the shower and i remembered a prayer request from one of my friends. i started praying but i felt really icky. i felt all sinful and dirty because lately i have not been up to par spiritually. i asked God, "how can i pray for other people when im so jacked up myself?" a few seconds later a little voice said, "I have made you righteous. Come before Me." oh man that made me cry. i do not cry. except when God makes me cry. which actually He does routinely. but other than that i do not cry. not even when people die or at funerals. so that was really cool and if you're feeling guilty about something and you're running from God, dont worry about it because He's already taken care of it. and thats all.

who cares?

2005-12-17T16:29:00.000-07:00

not that anyone cares really at all, i just thought it was exciting. i cut an inch off the back of my hair *gasp*. i know. actually it looks alright in my opinion. i was kind of growing a mullet. i dont even need to say what that would be like.... is disgusting the right word? disgusting does do justice. how about a revolting abhorrence? yeah. thats what a mullet is. so i do not have a mullet and no one can say otherwise now. yesssssssss. sorry that was a boring post. if you think it was boring, leave a comment that says, "nathan you are putrid at writing posts." i'd appreciate it. thank you.

purple finger

2005-12-14T15:01:00.000-07:00

i dont know if connor already posted on this, but he started a campaign at our school. it was pretty cool. it was basically to support democracy in iraq. so a bunch of people signed a petition and the news came. so pretty much you should watch the news tonight because connor will be on it. they interviewed him. so that means props to connor. congratulate him soon, or else i'll yell at you. since i yell a lot....

???????????

2005-12-10T14:25:00.000-07:00

i tried making a new post a few days ago, but for some reason i couldnt. something was wrong with the site or something. but anyway, i have this dumb history project. it involves drawing, gasp. i cant draw and i already know that. i wont be learning anything new by drawing. it takes me like 4 hours to turn out something my sister can do in 4 minutes. its really not fair at all. and completely off topic, congratulations to the choir people on thursday. most excellently done. to be honest, there were a few songs that almsot got to me, but my manliness held on and i didnt cry. haha.

Will the Real nathan Please Fall Down

2005-12-01T20:45:00.000-07:00

today i went running with natalie and laura at goodson. it was a good time. natalie sped up and laura and i decided to go chase her and catch up with her. well i sped up so fast that my legs couldnt move fast enough to keep up with me. in case you were wondering, thats bad. leaving your legs behind while running is a sure way to fall on your face. that is promptly what i did. fortunately, i have quick reactions and so i fell on my arm and rolled onto my back and commenced to skid across the carpet. i have burns on my shoulder and cuts on my hip and i bruised my hands. but most importantly, my pride decided to vacate the premises quite suddenly after this. how lame can you be? or maybe im so amazing that im too fast for my own good.... no.

Links

2005-11-28T19:46:00.000-07:00

so i pretty much am amazing and i have links now. its about time. see them over there on the right? ok so maybe im not so amazing since sara actually did them. i just watched. i see that she forgot to put herself on there. haha. and dont argue about the order please. they are in no particular order. so dont even pull that card. if you do, i'll just blame sara since she put them on there anyway. yesssss.

rock on

2005-11-22T11:24:00.000-07:00

so we are slackers. my band i mean. remember those cd's? i dont know what happened to those. sorry. we are still planning on recording sometime, but what we did last time didnt work. so i dont know. but to make up for our incredible slackerness, i have an announcement to make.

On November 30, we are opening for a band called TT Lester. we're using a different drummer (yeah opie) who is insanely good, and we added another guitarist (ryan fox, hes so foxy right now) who is also insanely good, just for this occasion. it is most excellent. november 30; we start at 7 pm. its at a place called Lifespot (right next to AHS). its on a wednesday, and the youth group is going, so if you're going to youth group, you're already coming. haha. hooray.

we're on stage from like 7-7:25 i think. we're just the opener. or from our perspective, TT Lester is closing for us... yeah. haha.

Colleen

2005-11-19T11:41:00.000-07:00

I decided to do something out of the ordinary. I am going to create a post about my sister. who does that? no one. thats why i am going to. plus my life is lame and i am falling back on her life.... maybe.

Colleen Marie Hooks. She is my sister and is 13 years old. She'll be 14 a week after i turn 17, which is in January. She goes to Powell, but went to Littleton Academy up through 6th grade. She is a girl and therefore takes a million years in the morning to get ready. she locks the bathroom door and i have to knock everytime i want to brush my teeth or something. her room is messier than mine, and she has flamingo streamers hanging from her doorway. her room smells like a thousand different lip glosses and hairsprays (which is probably better than what mine smells like). She is watching me right now as a write this, and she thinks its a but creepy, but I onviously dont care. haha. She has friends at Powell, but her best friend is probably a girl named Jordan, who goes to a different school. I dont remember which one. They are in a bit of a fight right now, but its just because they are pre-teen girls. thats my diagnosis. She will be a freshman next year and will join all the cool people at arapahoe. when she does, I will hunt down anyone who touches her. if she wants to date, they'll come through me first. she will not be a flirt because i wont let her; i will keep her in line but she will thank me as soon as i am gone. i hope. either way, it is my... duty. yeah. what else about my sister... shes very short- only 5-2. she only weighs 89 pounds. haha. shes skinnier than i am, but she doesnt think so. she plays soccer, but her team didnt win a single game all season. i think shes going to play tennis in high school.

i think thats about it. did i mention you cant touch her? haha.

darn you colleen

2005-11-13T13:10:00.000-07:00

dontcha wish your hair was straight like mine?
no. not so much. never again will this happen.

stoner

2005-11-09T15:24:00.000-07:00

today i got out of the shower at 7:05. that was bad. so i went to school with wet hair, which dried funny later on. and i was exhausted because... i dont know why, i just was. so today i pretty much looked like a stoner, acted like a stoner, and felt like a stoner. like really. and thats my stonerific post. sorry, i guess my life is a little boring. except last night was cool. more people should go to awana i've decided. and thats that.

farewell... for two days

2005-11-04T15:07:00.000-07:00

i am leaving town. thats right. on a church retreat. hooray for everyone else going! we will have a good time. for anyone not going, talk to connor. haha. (sorry connor).

Today we had to go to the office and affirm our names for this academic letter thingy. they asked what i wanted my name to be, and i said nathaniel because it sounds cool and i never hear it. the lady thought i was a freak. "are you playing a joke? it says 'nathan' right here." i thought thats what this was for... so we could make changes if neccessary. i am profiled. but i laughed because it was funny. emily was there. did i do something to make myself seem... wrong? tell me because i should come across like that anymore. well maybe i should because it made me laugh.

halloween- before

2005-11-01T14:57:00.000-07:00

I look like scary.

halloween- after

2005-11-01T14:55:00.000-07:00

do you like the cape?

bassman

2005-10-30T21:22:00.000-07:00

Today was insanely musical for me. i woke up at 5:30 and got to church at 6:30 to rehearse for the services. we started the services and were done by about 12:00. i counted and i logged over three hours of playing time at church. then i went to band practice at 12:30 and we played until 3:30. so thats another three hours of playing time. then i went to a practice for a party that im playing at in november and played from 5:00 to 8:00 with a half hour dinner break. so that another two and a half hours. 3+3+2.5= 8.5 hours. 8.5 solid hours of plucking strings with the same two fingers. you have no idea how glad i am i have calouses on those fingers; my fingers arent even sore from today. my left hand is a bit cramped because i went nuts in the services and band practice and played too fast. haha. at least its my left hand. and my shoulder hurts from hanging a guitar on it all day. the 8.5 hours was just the time i played. there were probably about two extra hours besides that where i stood there with my guitar on my shoulder listening to our worship director. so my whole body is sore from playing bass guitar. wierd. I just felt like writing about this because i cant think of other days when i played that long. today was one of the best days i've had in a long time.

(Cd's are still coming. Chris wants to get them done really bad also. he promised a bunch of people at his school cd's, so he has a stake in this too. it will be worth the wait. there will only be 5 or 6 songs, but they will sound very good i think.) pretend like you care that you have to wait for your CD and make me feel cool. i would appreciate it. haha.

ps. the broncos are awesome. 49 to 21 win over the eagles. thats a victory against both super bowl teams, for those of you that didnt notice that before. we are material.

nothing t'all

2005-10-26T17:41:00.000-06:00

umm. yeah. about the CD's. they're still coming. we are definitely still going to get those to out to you guys. they just are going to take a bit longer than expected. i will let you know in a few weeks about when to expect them. sorry dudes. they're still coming, so dont worry. i know everyone was panicking... haha.

for everyone who goes to AHS, wait until you see me tomorrow. its going to be awesome. losing bets can indeed be fun.

lately, I have been disgusted with the worldliness i see everyday (no, this is not about myspace. haha.) Everywhere you go, people are consumed with themselves. I got so fed up. i prayed about it and the first thing that happened as soon as i stopped thinking about my self-righteousness was God saying, "look how easy it is to see faults in other people. where are your own?" it seems like more often than not, God is sarcastic with me when He teaches me a lesson. i tried arguing with Him. that didnt work. I have been fleshly and wordly. bottom line. how humbling... you go a week looking down at everyone else and thinking, "boy im glad im not like that," and then God says, "let's talk about you first." oops. i lose.

"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?"

so now im going to remove my plank.

fuball

2005-10-22T20:00:00.000-06:00

umm. we're still working on the CD. haha. we'll be done someday. dont worry, it will sound amazing. we didnt think we would get drums done, but it turns out we can mix them in using vocal mics on an extra track. so thats good for us.

so this is about the fuball game today. we got there really early and so I had a chance to watch the kickers and punters warm up. for those of you who dont know, i had planned on being a kicker and/or punter in high school. however, i never went through with it. but while i was watching, i realized that im just as good as most of them. im a dork. why didnt i play football? it made me mad and so i practiced after the game. i havent kicked in three years, but i made a 35-yard field goal and a 40 yard punt with a four second hangtime. tight. i've got like 7 months before next season. in 7 months im fairly certain i can build back my leg strength and consistency. so the plan is to get back in kicking shape like i was a few years ago, surpass my PRs, and be the starting kicker or punter on the varsity football team. heck, i'd take second string too. haha. what do you guys think?

Musack

2005-10-18T14:58:00.000-06:00

on thursday and maybe friday too, my band is recording some of our own stuff. since we own the music, i can legally burn CDs of it. sooooooooooo, if anyone would like a CD of our original music, that would be sweet. definitely leave a comment that says, "nathan, i would love a CD with your awesome music." they're quite free. if you ask for one, you wont be disapointed and it would make me feel really cool. thats right. its all about me.

coach campbell

2005-10-13T22:09:00.000-06:00

WTF mates? coach campbell, how is your record at 6-1? Because you've been carried there by your all-american players. look what happens when they're injured. you lose.

Chapparal was an easily winnable game. its quite simple. your star running back is out so the burden leans on the defense to make the plays. the defense cant make the plays unless you let them. its not that hard. when playing a team that has, literally, no passing game and rushes every down predictably, there are a few things you dont do. You dont play zone defense with a stuffed secondary. you dont need four flipping DBs on two or three recievers. especially when they are thrown about five total passes in the game. especially when their game plan centers around a running game. chaparal predictably set up a running game, you can ask connor. i told him in the car on the way there that chaparal would run the ball. with that easily foreseen, it seems obvious that stopping the running game would be the best plan. i can tell you right now that zone defense with 4 DBs will not stop a star running back. you play man defense. you play man on the recievers with your corners. you blitz with your safeties. you blitz with your linebackers. you blitz blitz blitz. with only one man on each reciever and blitzing with everyone else, do the math. thats two uncovered blitzers every down flying into the line if scrimmage. In essence, by playing with coach campbell's plan, we played two men down on each defensive play. we had two DB's on double coverage on reveivers who were never going to get the ball anyway.

two uncovered blitzers is how you stop a star running back. yes i know it sounds incredibly reckless. one man on each reciever! its insane. but its not really. especially when one of your cornerbacks has six interceptions in as many games. especially when only five passes were attempted anyway. especially when half of those attempted passes hit the ground before reaching the reciever. its terrible. chaparal was the most extreme running team i have ever seen in my life. they literally rushed more than nine times out of ten. why, coach campbell, would you play four zoned DB's against a team like that? why? if you play with the blitzers, you stop the run. if you stop the run, you win the game. its that simple.

did that make sense? im sorry if it didnt. i really needed to rant. this was more for me than everyone else. haha. if you did understand what i said, please tell me what you think. seriously. i would love to know if im just being an idiot. dont hesitate to just say, "nathan, you're an idiot."

roller coasting

2005-10-09T12:26:00.000-06:00

so i should say something about homecoming. it was cool. i had fun. it was a good time to just let loose and do whatever. if anyone did not have fun, tell me, and i will yell at you.

so the real point of this post is about life. life is a huge roller coaster, spiritually i mean. its insane; it really is an adventure. so this is what i wrote this morning. Pretty much this is a picture of my life. sorry for the dramatics. haha.

Oh Lord, hear my cry. Why has this foe risen again?
How many times must I be struck down to the ground before Your hand finishes what I cannot?
You said, "Go into the brimstone." So for the sake of Your name I went where few have dared go.
What have I found but this enemy?
I have passed through the brimstone as You commanded, only to arrive at the fire.
Will I be chased through the fire as well?
Oh Lord, my body is broken from this journey, my bones are weary of being struck upon the rock.
But if You command me so, I will pass through the fire, hindered by the pursuing evil.
The fire will scorch my skin, and lick the wounds handed me by my foe.
Lord, you know my plea: strike down what has thus far destroyed me; take away this evil.
I will continue on the path you have commanded.
If You permit it so, the fiend will follow me even here, as it has already.
When I have emerged from the fire, bloodied by the evil, I will collapse upon Your doorstep.
Your ever-loving hand will gather up my pieces into the House of Many Rooms.
There I will arise anew at your feet to hear, "Well done, good and faithful servant."
Lord, such an acclamation is what I long to hear from my Beloved Savior.
Amidst the fire will I do battle with the evil foe to bring glory to Your name, for You are the Most High God.
For You I ventured into the brimstone, for You I have fought this evil, and for You I will delve into the fire while pursued by my foe.
Only by Your strength are such things possible.
Lord, you bandaged my feet when I walked through the brimstone; You lead me through it's maze.
How many blows from my enemy You have sustained for me I do not know.
And Lord, when I dive into the fire, followed by this evil, I know that You will be with me.
For such is Your love.
Your glory exceeds time and into the Heavens.
Your strength sustains me.
Your power turns my lament into a declaration of Your holiness, which is, which has been, and which will be forevermore.