Grace

There's a guy in my Xavier program who's smart . . . I mean, he's impressively intelligent. He's down to earth but can throw around five dollar words with relative ease. I've really enjoyed getting to know him. And he's an atheist.

Funny thing for an atheist to attend a Catholic university, eh?

Anyway we're in a class tonight, a course covering the development of Christian theology from the Reformation until now, and we were discussing Luther's perspective on justification by faith. Basically, Luther wrote that we are saved neither by faith nor works but by the grace of Christ [it's more nuanced than that, but it's not where I'm going with this].

So this really smart guy, the atheist, asks a question of the professor:

"What do you mean when you say the word 'grace'?"

He had never really been exposed to the theological concept that is Christian grace.

I almost wanted to turn around and excitedly explain it to him myself. The professor did a decent job of defining grace in a textbook fashion, but I found it wanting because it was devoid of the personal encounter. As I think about it, I think she defined it without any reference to Jesus [which is entirely legitimate as grace was present in the Old Testament. But I'm not sure I would now converse about the topic without noting the importance of Jesus' death].

Then again, I wondered, "if an atheist asked me, 'what is grace?' would I have an acceptable response?" As a minister with over a decade of theological schooling, I'm still not entirely sure how I would answer that question. This isn't to say that I haven't chewed on it myself; trust me, I've thought a lot about it. But I suggest that how we define grace ought to differ from person to person, i.e., we each view the grace of God differently in our own lives. And that's one of the amazing aspects of the gospel message- there is no one true definition but it can be expressed in many different ways without losing it's transformative power.

Perhaps there are times when we who are fluent in "Christianese" ought to beware that we assume people know what we're talking about. Faith is a complex matter and it never hurts to double check to make sure you're being understood.

That said, I love difficult questions. So how do you answer it:

What is grace?

Soupa' Bo' Thoughts

Going into it, I really didn't care who won last night's game. There was nothing at stake for me, sans wanting a great football game. I, like the odds-makers in Vegas who are feeling it this morning, thought the Patriot's would go in and take care of business. Apparently we were wrong.

By the second half, with the Giants defense having established themselves in the trenches, I was full-out rooting for Giants to make plays. After the Pats scored with a little less than three minutes left, I stated that if Eli Manning drove them the length of the field to win the game, he could have an average career and make the Hall of Fame. This wasn't nearly as bold a prediction as the male in a soon-to-be-married couple made the statement that if Plaxico Burress scored the game winning touchdown, they would name their first child after him [hope it's a boy].

Still, the pitch and catch from Eli to David Tyree [video here until it's removed by Fox] was one of the most amazing plays in Super Bowl history. I literally fell out of my chair and was on the floor. It was unbelievable. At this point, I'm thinking the Giants have to win because that play will still be shown long after I'm dead.

I read last night where people were hatin' on this game, calling it boring. But if you were a true football fan, it was far from it. The Giants' defense went in last night and did was called impossible. And the last eight minutes were legendary.

I also remarked last night that perhaps we [football enthusiasts and professional analysts] missed something about the Patriots. True, they've won three championships this decade, but it came as the result of good defense. I'm not saying Tom Brady and his offense were inept over that run, but definitely overrated. This year was different. New England's strength was their offense. And the adage the defense wins championships still seems to apply [in this decade, that also applied to the Super Bowls won by Baltimore, Tampa Bay, and New England].  That's why it seems surreal the New York won the Super Bowl, but their defense has been spectacular. Then all you need is an offense to make a couple of plays, which the Giants did. And now they're number one.

It has me thinking about the Bengals and Chad Johnson. I'm still not in favor of getting rid of him, as it would kill the salary cap, but if they could get some amazing defensive talent out of it, then I'd send him packing in a heartbeat. We love to see Carson let 'er fly, but the reason the Bengals have zero playoff wins since Palmer's arrival is that the defense sucks. With a lights-out defense, and a QB like Carson, you could put schleps out there catching passes and still be OK.

Anyway, football's finally over and now it's on to Spring Training, March Madness, and the Masters.

I love the changing seasons.

See Dead People

When a local news issue has ethical and religious undertones, I feel obligated to chime in. There's a new exhibit at the Cincinnati Museum Center called Bodies. It's a display of human cadavers and organs from unclaimed bodies in China. It opens today and will make a seven month run here.

It's created a little stir here locally, as the Archbishop forbade Catholic schools to use it for field trips and a few people even protested the exhibit's arrival. For Archbishop Pilarczyk, it's an issue of human dignity, although he didn't demand that Catholics avoid it altogether. For others, it's about human rights, as exhibitors aren't sure whether or not the bodies were Chinese political prisoners, as the nation is notorious for violating human rights issues.

So how do people of faith deal with this exhibit?

First, we need to recognize that this isn't a Biblical issue; there is nothing explicitly "un-Christian" going on here. So now we have to approach it as a purely ethical decision that needs to be explored.

I will respectfully disagree with the Archbishop that this is an issue of human dignity. We live in the most sophisticated societies in world history. I know people my age and older who have never actually seen a dead body. I'm not sure that would have been possible in societies until the last century. And if we are truly concerned about issues of human dignity, I'd suggest that atrocities taking place in third world countries around the world are much more disturbing than this science exhibit. So I'm not buying this as a reason.

I would be more bothered with the possible Chinese human rights violations. I wonder if the Chinese government was able to significantly profit as a result of this exhibit. I'm not sure I want to take their word that these people just "happened to die." But that being said, why couldn't a similar bodies exhibit be created out of American cadavers? I would suspect that a lot of people would volunteer to let their innards tour the country after they die. I do think there's something to knowing the legitimacy of the bodies in the exhibit.

That said, I can't argue that there's an ethical issue present here. So if you want to, go see it. I here that it's fascinating. Not quite sure I'll go, however, because I'm a cheap skate and can see similar stuff on the Discovery Channel.

Flip It

Good news: it's no longer January. And the people rejoiced.

Or, at least, I rejoiced.

I'm not a big fan of January. It's actually my least favorite month. It seems to last forever and the cold weather exacerbates its position. It should be noted that I'm February is my second least favorite month. But it steers clear from "the worst" distinction because 1) it has fewer days than January [even in a leap year] 2) it's now the month of Kaelyn's birthday so I'm liking it more and 3) it's one month closer to spring.

So here's to one another cold month in the books while inching ever closer to a warmer and greener existence.

It's Gotta Be The Shoes

I just started writing this post with an idea in mind and realized I deviated a bit. And it got pretty long. But I was feeling the flow and just went with it. If you like it: good, but I enjoyed writing it so . . . there. This evening's admission: I'm a'feared of getting old.

No, I'm not concerned about mo' money and mo' problems. I'm just afraid of slowing down. Recently I've encountered some thirty-somethings who look and move a lot slower than I do. I'm trying to stave off the effects of aging as long as possible. So I've been pushing myself, even in these winter months, to do more athletically. I'm playing basketball a couple mornings a week and playing indoor soccer on the weekends. When I get some extra time, I work out over at Xavier.

It should be noted: I suck at basketball. I play for the exercise. And I hate lifting weights and treadmills. But I love soccer. And I'm somewhat good at it. So it's my athletic passion. I was playing co-ed soccer this past session and, despite my age, my game has emerged. I've actually become one of the better players on our team. When I played in college I was not a goal scorer but in co-ed I am. Last week I scored two goals in the first three minutes. I've never had a hat-trick and tried the rest of the game but was unsuccessful. So I thought I was pretty awesome.

Until last week.

Some guys I've played with before asked me to play in a men's league and I was excited about getting to play without chicks on the field. I went in ready to go and . . . played . . . horrible. The pace was much faster than co-ed I didn't do anything well. And it really depressed me for a couple of days. That fear of losing a step gripped me.

But then I recognized that I actually love the higher level of competition. Even though I sucked, I wanted to come back and go at it again. I have since decided that I'm going to keep playing soccer into my forties. And I need to start playing in competitive men's leagues [scaling back my co-ed play] so I can keep that fire going. So in keeping with this resolution, I needed to go out and get a new set of cleats. Another admission: I love soccer cleats. I can't wait until I force Kaelyn Kaelyn decides to play soccer and I can buy her little soccer boots.

I've had the same pair of Adidas Copas since 1996. Copas are the perfect soccer cleat: black kangaroo leather, classic look, awesome. I bought a size 8.5 [half a size too small], showered while wearing them to stretch the leather around my feet, and reveled in the perfect fit. They're not falling apart yet, but I have a feeling that they're going to rip sometime soon. And I need to have a pair broken in if/when those die. But a new pair of Copas would cost towards $100 and I don't play enough anymore to justify dropping that much cash on cleats. So I did some more looking around and got a great sale on the current cheap version of the Copa [the Telstar], but have yet to shower in them. I'll keep you posted when I get around to that.

That guys league team needed another player tonight so I went back for round two, new shoes and all. This time I was intent on playing better and making things happen. Ironically, we were playing a team of young guys [what seemed to be local high school varsity players] but I easily ran with them. I took some hard shots on goal, had a couple of assists and felt like I redeemed myself. I finally felt back at home on the field.

All I want to do is go out and compete as long as possible. It might be gone tomorrow, but at least I have today.

And I really don't think it was the shoes, but I felt good out there tonight.

And I like feeling good . . . and abandoning that fear'dedness.

Willow Creek Shake-Up

Time for a little shop talk. Unless you're into evangelical church conversation, this post might be boring. But I find this fascinating and needed to note it. During the past few years Willow Creek Community Church in Chicago, one of the largest and most influential evangelical churches in the nation, has developed a dream team of teaching pastors to take them into the future. Founder and Senior Pastor Bill Hybles went out and got some of the best communicators in the nation to join his staff so he could devote more time to overseeing national and international interests. Two of the three men he added came from my movement of churches, so I was very interested in these moves. Now, a little more than three years later, all three have resigned within a nine-week span, and one of those did so without having future employment lined up.

All the men said the right things in their resignation letters, something to the effect that "God was leading them to another place." This might indeed be true, but whenever three people get the same message, I tend to think something is up. I don't think it an unspiritual endeavor to read between the lines.

All the men left incredibly successful churches to go to Willow Creek. As Willow is known as one of the leading churches among evangelical congregations, I could see why these men thought that the jump to the "ultra-big" time was a good idea. But apparently the grass was greener on the other side. I'm not saying that Willow Creek is a bad place, but it definitely has its own culture that is more results driven than many churches. It's gotta be tough adjusting to a new role in that environment. Perhaps that's what led to these departures: when the new car smell wears off, you're still driving the same streets [my weak attempt at a deep metaphor].

I'm not sure what can be learned from this, as the true story here will most likely never surface. That said, I opine that this situation will become the norm in the years to come with many megachurches. Each leader wants to enact change on their institutions and turning them around is like maneuvering a cruise liner. That's why many ministers [um, I guess like me] choose, rather, to start their own churches. With Echo, I've been able to lead at my speed and according to my strengths. I don't have to fight an established church culture.  Of course, some guys going this route don't have the skills to start their own church and I imagine the new church failure rate will skyrocket in the years to come.

Churches are a funny thing, eh?

Question: Do We Rock The Vote?

I need your honest opinion. Something's running in my head and I'm wondering if I should run with it. I read all the local Cincinnati publications including City Beat, an independent weekly paper. Every year they name their "Best of Cincinnati" list, their most popular issue of the year. Among the lists of best restaurants and local stores they name a best church. For the past few years that church has been Crossroads in Oakley.

I'm wondering if this is the year we should stuff the ballot box and try to get Echo to win the title of "Cincinnati's Best Church."

Now don't get me wrong: it's not that I don't think Crossroads is a great church; I have quite a few friends on staff their and truly appreciate their ministry in the city. But they've had a good run of it and it is a little better known than Echo so they don't necessarily need that title for anything. For us, the free publicity could . . . well, at least get our name out there.

And I am very proud of our church. We're clearly not the best at any one thing, but I love our church and think it's one of the best this city has to offer.

And that's why I'm looking for your opinions. Is this a little too gimmicky for us? Is it lame? Would we be trying to hard to get some free pub?

Honestly, I could go either way. I'm not that hard up for affirmation but if enough people were interested, I think we could get this thing going. Likewise, if enough of you faithful readers thought it was a dumb idea, I would accept.

So leave a comment below and let me know.

I Must Protest

Had a great time on Saturday attending the wedding of our neighbors Dustin and Teresa. It took place at the beautiful St Monica's church in Clifton Heights. The church, it should be noted, was absolutely gorgeous. It was the first Catholic wedding that Kelly and I have attended. And although I've been to mass before, it was Kelly's first Catholic service altogether. When you're a Protestant in a Catholic service, you feel out of place. There are a lot of aspects to Catholic worship that are learned over years of attendance [and confirmation class]. And even though I have my Cincinnati westside credentials, which makes me at least partially Catholic, I couldn't keep up; I was always late standing up, sitting down or kneeling. I have quite a few theological objections to Catholicism, and can be embarrassed by its legacy, but I refuse to dismiss all the good the Catholic church has done and is doing in this world. In short, I'm not switching sides but I won't Catholic bash either.

From my recent experiences, I could see why many Protestants choose to convert to Catholicism; there's a certain comfort in the liturgy that is absent in many Protestant churches. And there's a certain reverence of God, perhaps a mystic quality, that is somewhat attractive. Confirming this is many people I observe in my master's program at Xavier who are Catholic converts.

Likewise, I can understand why Catholics flee for evangelical churches. When you have no other frame of reference but that of a distant God who requires pageantry and exact language, you might navigate towards more simplistic form of worship.

It is a good reminder to me as a Protestant minister, living in a Catholic city, attending a Catholic graduate school, of balancing the kind of worship we encourage in our church. Remembering God as dwelling afar, as well as in our midst.

Good Folk

Yesterday morning I was, again, at the little country church in New Richmond for Sunday morning services. I was surprised to see Bill and Betty Bravard there. Bill has been a professor at Cincinnati Bible Seminary for over twenty years and he and his wife attended our church when I was growing up. They now live in the New Richmond area, so they stopped by to hear me preach. Bill and Betty have continually invested in me and my ministry, from high school until today. They've sat through many of my sermons and they still come back for more. Throughout starting our church, Bill has been in contact with me; he was one of the first people I consulted with when we decided to do this.

After church yesterday we went out to lunch and talked for a couple hours about Echo, local churches, and my family. It was a great time of encouragement for me as I hold their opinion in high regard.

It's good to have older, wiser people in your life who will be honest with you. We always need mentors. Regardless of how old you are, I hope you're investing in the people around you. It makes a difference.

In Pursuit

Excited to here how things went today with Matt Mehaffey, a fellow CCU alum, whose crew officially started a new church in Miami, Florida this morning. Pursuit Christian Church is now officially open for business. Starting a new church is the craziest thing I've ever done in my life and I have much respect for anyone who has ever done it. If you have the desire to do a "missions trip" anytime soon, I know they still could use help. I'm just hoping they'll need someone to fill-in preach sometime soon. I would labor for the Lord on South Beach . . . if I had to.

Fingernails On The Blackboard

Echo's relationship with the church from which we rent has been a blessing. We can store our equipment on site which means our set-up time is minimal. The building is in great shape, with fully operational heating and cooling. The rent is dirt cheap, which definitely helps our overall budget. All in all, things are awesome. But allow me to express the one thing that annoys me about our rental space.

A choir meets there the second Sunday night each month; it should be noted that no one from their church is actually part of this choir. It's a community choir, comprised of people from all over the greater Cincinnati area. They meet in the church's fellowship hall and usually have a pot-luck dinner afterward. They don't bother us too much except that they take up almost all the parking in the lot when they gather. Repeated attempts to claim our fair use of parking have proven unsuccessful. My only hope was that their choir would eventually dwindle until there is no one left.

I might not be that lucky.

Kelly directed me to a Time Magazine article devoted to Sacred Harp singing, the kind of music this choir performs [actually, they never actually "perform." They only practice. Still not sure about that]. Sacred Harp is a bizarre harmonic, shaped-note singing of old Christian hymns. It dates back to the Civil War but I had never heard of it until we started Echo. I listened to some of the music online from a PBS special on Sacred Harp but, even when done at a professional level, it doesn't sound very appealing.

So the article says that Sacred Harp is the new, hipster activity to do. Even though they sing Christian hymns, it has broad appeal; it's popular among people from various religious backgrounds. And now that Time has covered it, I bet more locals will come out for the sing-sing in the fellowship hall. In short, parking is going to be impossible to get at Echo on February 10th.

And, long-term, I guess the choir won't be going anywhere soon.

Suck.

Of course, if that's the worst thing we have to deal with the amazing space we have the opportunity to use, then I have nothing to complain about.

I'm A Little Sick . . .

. . . of all this campaign mud-slinging. I've decided that I'm definitely not going to vote for Bill Clinton this fall. Oh, Bill's not running? I'm confused. Sure sounds like he is.

For You To Find Funnies With

By far, one of my favorite comedy troops was The State. MTV ran a series by the group in the early 1990's. Some of those performers are now featured in Comedy Central's Reno 9-1-1. Ironically, I've never really watched Reno. I'm sure it has to be somewhat funny, but I've never bought in. I've been bummed because I have a VHS tape of the best skits by The State but no longer have a VCR so I thought I'd never see them again.

For some reason I was thinking of one of their skits this morning, and it inspired my Facebook update this morning. I took a trip to YouTube and found the skit there. Take sometime to discover what one does with $240 worth of pudding.

Might I also suggest watching any one of these clips for some PG-rated entertainment [every word a different link there]. Not the best quality, but you get the gist.

Also, the rumors are that Comedy Central will air a new special by The State sometime in the next year or so. Just thought you should know.

Miggity Mac

No, I'm not getting a Mac Book Air anytime soon. This is one instance where Steve Jobs totally missed the market. The Air is the kind of laptop you get if your purchase only depends on aesthetics. Fortunately for Apple, that is a market and they'll sell a few of them. I predict that it won't have staying power. Spent last week upgrading the MacBook Pro and things are operating well. Thanks to the Dale for spotting a good price, I finally installed Leopard and am loving all it does. I've not explored all the new features yet, but I can already tell it operates much faster than Tiger. Before I upgraded, I did diagnostics and deleted unused apps, so it's like I'm using a brand new machine.

Additionally, I picked up some new apps at Mac Heist. For those Apple-using folk unfamiliar with it, I suggest heading over there and checking things out. Currently you can pick up 14 different applications which normally retail for $500 at the low, low price of fifty bucks. It's a special that only lasts a couple more days, so the time's a tickin'.

Understanding the Interwebs

A few months ago a caught wind of a video made by some guys at my alma mater entitled Price Hill Girlz. Take a look at it now if you haven't seen it yet. Pretty good work. I have no tolerance when it comes inappropriate  [read: racist] humor and this didn't even make the radar. I realized that the viral nature of the video was picking up as two people with absolutely no connection to Cincinnati Christian University emailed me the video this last week. Apparently it hit the media this week as both a local television station and radio station commented on the video. Media vultures: if there's even a hint that you can lambaste Christians for something that could be deemed "unspiritual," they're all over it.

It is my understanding that the emergence of this video left the school's administration scrambling as the inevitable "I'm offended" calls started to come in. I'm not quite sure how they've handled it. The video was originally pulled from YouTube earlier this week but someone else put it right back up. Hopefully the students who made it don't face any repercussion, especially since I did much worse than making a stupid video like that when I was in school.

If you take a look at some of the local buzz surrounding it [even from a liberal mag], many in the community seem to get it: it's a joke. It shows that CCU students are somewhat relevant and have a good sense of humor. In fact, this viral video has done as a good a job marketing the school than renting out billboards and bus ads.

Speaking as a former president of the university's alumni association, as well as a former employee who worked in the field of student recruiting, I'd take a different angle with these guys: I'd get them to make more videos. This kind of stuff resonates with seventeen and eighteen year-old kids. Plus, despite people who get ticked-off at anything and will voice their opposition, I think it gives the community a new perspective of the school, showing the creativity of its students.

The internet, and the way this emerging generation uses it, is forcing high school and college administrators to grapple with how they interact with the students. In many cases, faculty and staff are uncertain of what students are doing out on the world wide web and their natural response by officials is fear. But you can't keep kids away from the internet; it's now a part of their life and their education. Instead, they need to make concerted efforts to understand their online habits so, when something like a video going viral makes waves, they react responsibly.

All in all, not a big deal.

These Hills

Dan, whose blog is a must read for those interested in learning about the history/architecture of Cincinnati, wrote a nice brief post on the origins of Walnut Hills. While I was familiar with Rev. James Kemper building the first settler dwelling in Cincinnati outside the lower bowl, I thought I read/heard somewhere that the first road up a hill was put in by he and his sons at Mount Adams [then Mount Ida].

This is a great place to live if you love history.

The Fifth Gospel

This Sunday night I'll be teaching from 1 Samuel 17: the conflict between David and Goliath. I've enjoyed preparing this week, excited to give further insight to a popular Biblical tale. One of the reasons I'm looking forward to it is that Kelly and I were able to stand in the Valley of Elah, the location of the epic battle, during our visit to Israel in 2005. Of course, I'll have pictures and a laser pointer ready to go. My dream is to one day be able to spend a summer sabbatical in Israel to spend extended time exploring the numerous holy sites. The land where the Bible took place is breathtaking; people have spent careers researching small aspects of archaeological sites. The great wealth of information that can be gleaned there has earned the land of Israel the distinction of "The Fifth Gospel." Indeed, a trip to Israel transforms the way that people think about the Bible.

An example of this is found in David Plotz, writer for Slate and a non-observant Jew, who read through the Bible without any commentaries, noting everything he observed. As part of the project he took a trip to Israel to see some sights, participate in an archaeology dig, and blog about his experience.

While at a place known as Maresha, an amazing site near the coastal plain that we were able to visit on our trip, he had an epiphany:

"It's a eureka moment for me. Suddenly, the wars of the Bible that made no sense on the page are perfectly comprehensible. The geography explains it all: On this side is the backward hill kingdom of Judah. On that side is the technologically advanced coastal kingdom of the Philistines. And here, in between them, is the fortress line that must not break. Standing on this ancient hilltop, looking over a landscape that has not changed much since the Book of Kings . . . I can see the Bible more clearly than I read it. To my right, the mighty nations of the coast; to my left, a tiny tribal kingdom with only one god and the germ of a great civilization—the beginning of our world."

Many people who dismiss the Biblical story as mythology have never been to the Holy Lands. It makes it even more difficult to ignore that there is something about this book. I'm not saying that the archaeology proves the Biblical story; faith is still necessary. But it does speak as powerfully as the Biblical text itself.

iWork

A couple of weeks ago I neglected to observe an anniversary as I completed two years of full-time employment at Echo Church. I took no salary the first few months we started the church and transitioned to a somewhat pro-rated salary our first full year. So I'm now in year three of employment here, somewhat giddy, because by the end of the year I will have surpassed my longest tenure of employment at any one place since leaving college. Ironically, while I recycle jobs every couple of years, Kelly has stayed at the same place for almost ten years now. The good news is I have no plans of leaving Echo ever. I have found my dream job. Honestly, despite the financial uncertainties associated with starting a new church, I have never been happier anywhere else. I sometimes feel that I should be apologetic about this, as not everyone is as fortunate to have a job they love. But reading this article today makes me feel a little better bragging about my contentment.

Why would I feel guilty about this? I could attribute part of it to growing up the child of workaholics. My parents operated as such, not to amass great wealth, but because it was a value intrinsic to their upbringings; they were taught that hard work was a godly trait. As a result, however, I've always struggled with feelings of guilt about how hard I work. It's tough to compare the stress and exhaustion I feel while working to that of my father and brother who spend the majority of their time in physical labor exposed to the elements. While my mind is fried while contemplating logistics issues, their skin is fried from sunburn. While I'm numb pondering an unsolvable ministry situation, their extremities are literally numb with frostbite. Sure, I work hard, but it's a different kind of work.

The transition to starting a church has made this even more difficult. For the first time in my life, I really don't have a boss [well, um, except God?] and I have to be self-motivated. Working at home would seem to make this even more difficult, and the addition of both a work-at-home wife and precious daughter should make it impossible. But, as a truly evaluate the situation, I think it has worked out extremely well.

That said, I don't work 9am to 5pm. I don't have a separate office area in the house where I get work done [thank God for laptop computers]. I don't detail my to-do list to make sure I'm on track. These are all things you're supposed to do when you work out of the home, and I basically neglect them.

But I thrive in an opportunity where I can be free to be creative in my own time. Sometimes that means waking up at 5am to go to a coffee shop to get some work done. Sometimes it's 2am and I can't get that week's Scripture text out of my mind. While I rarely ever "take a day off," I make sure to work hard when I need to and unwind so as not to go crazy. Kelly and I have said it before but, honestly, Echo is our second child. I'm totally committed to our church and what God is going to do in this city and it doesn't package nicely into a job description.

In case you doubt, believe it: I love my job.

By the by, I don't fight that workaholic guilt as much anymore. I've come to grips with it. There's always going to be someone who wants to lament that you have a cake job and make you feel bad about yourself. I don't give a rip. It's my life and I'm doing the best I can with what I have. And my family has been more supportive than I could ever have imagined. From their workaholic perspective, I'm doing alright.

And that's alright with me.

*Seth Godin expresses some thoughts on workaholism on his blog. It's good stuff.

The Battle For Our City

Here's today's edition of Why People Think Cincinnati Sucks But, In Reality, It's Our Screwed Up City-County System Of Government. Two examples for you: First, the Freedom Center is asking the city and county to pay $1million for land in order to start the riverfront Banks project. This is laughable not just because it's a horrible museum, but because said land was originally given to the museum for free. Additionally, the Center has taken advantage of taxpayer money to keep from closing its doors. So the way they say, "thanks" for the way the local community has bailed them out is to try to rob them blind. I guess freedom truly isn't free. This could bring the riverfront development to yet another standstill.

Second example is of the county prosecutor, ever the politician and still bitter he didn't a get a new jail, who recently came out bashing Cincinnati as a crime-ridden cesspool. Joe Deters channels the spirit of frighten suburbanites everywhere declaring he wouldn't let his son be caught dead [pun intended] in Over-The-Rhine. He spews ignorant rhetoric like "no one goes downtown anymore" which, to anyone truly familiar with the situation, knows is the exact opposite. I'd expect to hear him back-peddle in the next couple of days. This is going to blow up in his face.

More and more I'm getting sick of hearing suburbanites comment on what's wrong with the city when they only make their way down here once a year. Yeah, this place ain't perfect, but neither are the 'burbs. Let's all just settle down and try to get along.

Sucks To Be Romo . . .

I'm sure he thought dating Jessica Simpson wouldn't be a big deal. I guess it's not as long as you win the play-off game the week after you vacationed with her. Dallas lost to New York this afternoon and Tony Romo had a mediocre game. The media was waiting for this failure with baited breath and it came fruition. The fury has been unleashed and he'll hear about it the entire off-season, and maybe longer. Now the Dallas quarterback will have to endure people questioning his judgement and rightly so. You might think one's "private life" should remain private, but all bets are off when you're a high-profile public athlete. You're now a celebrity. With all the endorsements comes a lot of scrutiny. You asked for it, and you got it.

It should be noted that I predicted the Jessica Simpson slide long ago; once she divorced Cincy-boy Nick Lachey, it's been all downhill. Dane Cook? John Mayer? And now getting killed on SportsCenter? Things could be better. And Nick's slow and steady pace has helped him stay somewhat relevant. And Jessica's departure has probably left him . . . sane.

How 'bout them Cowboys?