WHEN IT HAILS FUN IN EL CAJON

So it's been stormin' like crazy the last 3 days.  I wish I was going to the snow tomorrow, cuz the pow pow is gonna be 12 feet deep in tahoe.  Dang I wish I was there.

In the meantime, we've had tons of rain saturate our land, our car port/cover thing went flying in some kinda torrential wind storm that ripped it to bits and landed it like 40 feet away-upside down in my yard, and then bits and stints of hail.

Usually it would rain hard, hail for a second, then stop.  Today about 4:30pm though, it rained, then it hailed, then it really hailed, then it started dropping 3/8" balls.

Then it covered my entire street.  

Then it got the UPS guy stuck as he spined his wheels.

Then it turned into bowling for brothers and sisters as the big kids were too heavy to slide, but the ice balls were large and regular enough for the entire neighborhood to sled our street with the little ones.  

Then TJ figured out that the trampoline was covered in balls of ice and yeah... that's way fun when you're 12!!

There you go, one crazy San Diego day for the memory books!

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LET THE COMEDY BEGIN...

On my way up to speaking at a winter retreat, our carpool past this sign off the 15 in Mesquite Nevada, just before the AZ border.

I laughed for like 10 miles.

This photo is crying out for a caption.  Here's mine:

"You can buy a burger for a buck, but it'll cost you two if you wanna give it back."

What's yours?

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HAITI NEEDS OUR HELP

You know that a major 7.0 earthquake hit Haiti on Tuesday.
You know the death toll is rising and that at least 40,000 people already have died.
You know that over a million people liver there on less than $2 a day.
You know that many of those devastated are small children.
You know the world is sending aid to them.
You know that we are part of the world and called to act.

You know that if you are a follower of Jesus, multiply the previous sentence times 10.

So I gave what I could to World Vision today to help them. I also got an e-mail from Todd Tolson at our office explaining 3 possible ways our church can help this weekend. All are good ways you might consider.

Here you go:

1. Samaritan's Purse. SP is already on the ground in Haiti. They say they are capable of bringing in 12,000-15,000 gallons of fresh, clean water daily. They are also building 6,000 temporary shelters, with more everyweek. They are bringing in hygiene kits, medical equipment and supplies to a Hospital they've been working with for more than 30 years.
2. World Vision. Today at 5:30pm CST, World Vision is flying from Denver to Port-au-Prince with 18 metric tons of supplies, which includes food, water, blankets, tents, etc... World Vision is asking for prayer, donations & child sponsorship.
3. One Day's Wages. One Day's Wages is a young, international grassroots organization dedicated to ending global poverty by encouraging others to donate their One Day's Wage. They've partnered with Global Concern, another organization that has been in Haiti since 1978. They're headquartered in Port-au-Prince, and miraculously, their building is still standing... which makes them a prime target for people seeking aid. Right now they're giving out water, plastic sheeting for temporary shelter and blankets. (Side note: I was in a fraternity and went to college with Eugene Cho, the founder of ODW. He's a great guy and this is a GREAT movement to support. That's another blog post though).

Choose one of those, or the red cross, or any org. you choose. But unless you're getting on a plane to help them with your own hands and feet, I think sending money is a mandate for those with the RIDICULOUS LUXURY of a computer and internet access.

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INTRODUCING THE BERRY FAMILY POINT JARS

I came home after seminary to be bum rushed by all my kids in the driveway. I heard them upstairs yelling, "Dad's home. Dad's home." They then ran outside proclaiming, "the jars are here. the jars are here. Mom wouldn't let us open them without you."

What jars you ask? Well, last week in a moment of angst, I told my kids that I'd been thinking, and it was time I instituted a point system. "Help a family member.. earn a point. Act selfish and walk up the stars not taking your room mates coat up in your empty hands and it'll cost you point", I decreed from the stairs.

My wife overheard my banter and proclaimed, "I like it. Let's do it."

So, I went surfing the net for the perfect jar and poker chips for points.

We then spent a dinner last week talking about how these jars work, and they could hardly wait to get started. So here's the plan:

GREEN CHIPS ARE FOR GOOD BEHAVIOR. We give them liberally for the following:

• do your chores without us asking
• keep your room clean.
• say nice words. be an encourager.
• get a good report from the sitter.
• eat all your dinner
• good grades
• show selfless servanthood like Jesus himself. Bonus if you are dressed like Jesus.
• etc.

BLACK CHIPS ARE FOR BAD BEHAVIOR. We give them sparingly for the following:

• say mean things
• don't do what you are asked to do, when you are asked to do it.
• do what you are asked to do, but do it so poorly you have to do it again.
• act selfish and look out for only you
• pitch a fit
• refuse to kiss your dad
• etc...

STUFF YOU CAN DO WITH GREEN CHIPS IF YOU HAVE NO BLACK CHIPS:

• buy desert after dinner
• get wii time on a school night
• ice cream trips
• stay up late and watch a movie on the weekend
• spend the night at a friends
• etc.

THE RULES:

• green chips can only be spent if there are no black chips in your jar.
• black chips can be redeemed with 3 green chips.
• you can never ask "can I do that for a green chip", or you can do it for no chip or a black chip, your choice.
• only mom and dad can award/redeem chips
• how many green chips you get, how many chips something costs to buy, or how many black chips are passed out is the sole discretion of mom and dad.

There you go. We're playin' poker the Berrytribe way. Wish us luck!!!

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BONDING WITH THE CRAWFORDS

A very rare treat was enjoyed by the Berrytribe this weekend.  I think maybe for the second time in the 5 years we have lived in SD, Alisha, Brad, and the cousins were able to join us for a couple of days of bonding.  Such a rare time.  I wish we lived closer to my sister and her family.  We all love it.

They have been here in the states for about 5 weeks and leave in mid January back to Kampala, Uganda until June.  We got to spend the weekend with them so, we decided to spend Saturday (minus TJ who went to winter camp with Riptide) together at the children's museum in downtown SD and act like kids.  We then cruised over to seaport village for some more fun and topped it off by heading to Red Robin for all you can eat glutton free fries in La Jolla :)

They say a picture is worth a thousand words.  Here's like 16,000 words:

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BLOGGIN' AND SUCH AT JOURNEY

I'm just one of a team of people that blog/twitter at journey.

I try and write a blog post here at least once a week, and it's read mostly by friends, ministry cohorts, and family I think. I don't believe I have much of an "internet audience", which is no big deal to me. I have not tried to create a big draw and I mostly write as a way for me to pseudo express myself and for distant friends and family to drop in on my life. It got a grip of hits when we were in Uganda adopting, but now that's slowed down and my blog reader thingy says like 400 or so of you read it in a given week- not including the facebook crowd where this automatically posts to my notes via a feed. So, whoever you are, welcome to my life in 2010 :)

Most of my posts are a mixture of my family, my ministry, my schooling, my travels, and some frequent shots via my photography... cuz that's me.

So, if you want a taste of ministry, family, leadership and leadings from some of the other people on our team based on what they post. Here's a quick list :) -

• Ed Noble (guru of tourmaline surf sessions and main teacher guy)
• Rod Kaya (guru of talks in Todd's office, announcements, and all kinds of weekend stuff)
• Todd Tolson (guru of facebook, fantasy football, computer repair, & discipleship classes.)
• Chris Rader (guru of anyone under the age of 12, ranting very irregularly, and unpainted offices)

AND I'M HAPPY TO ANNOUNCE THE NEWEST BLOG addition for 2010:

• Christina Robertson (guru of long walks on the beach, road trips, and all things middle school)

So, read up people! Good stuff awaits you.

If you wanna follow some of them and few more of our staff/ministries on twitter? Here you go:

• Sarah Merk-Benitez
• Ed Noble
• Todd Tolson
• Rod Kaya
• Christina Robertson
• Me
• journey
• encounter high school
• new format college age

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OBSOLETE IN 2010

"Welcome to 2010."

I can't believe how crazy that simple statement sounds to me though. I swear just yesterday people were freaking out if the whole world was gonna implode when 1999 hit the new millennium. Jake asked me on the way home from church on Sunday if the world was going to end in 2012 cuz that's what his friends are saying. I told him that was just a popular myth cuz of a movie that is out and he said, "why would a movie lie to people like that?" I told him it was cuz not all movies are true. This was evidently news to him, which is really scaring me about what he must think of his cartoons :)

Regardless of how we got to 2010 and when the world is going to end, I'm still clearly late to the party. Need proof?

• I have not seen any of the twilight films. I think I'm the only youth pastor in the country though. Someone asked me the other day, "You work with students and have not seen twilight?" Yep, I'm that guy.
• I own a wii and was just given an xbox 360 by a student. However I rarely play either of them & still suck at virtually all video games.
• I still have a home phone. (Not one newly wed couple or young single I know even has one, they only use cell phones. I tried to cancel mine and get with it, but it's part of a package deal with cable/internet and if I drop it, my bill actually goes up)
• Speaking of cable, I should cancel mine any day now too. You can watch almost anything online now anyway. I'm positive this is only a matter of time, but currently I'm still in the DVR dark ages.
• I have an HDTV now, but only a DVD player. We are in the non-blueray abyss I hear.
• We still check the mail. I talked to a friend today who didn't get our yearend/christmas letter cuz it was mailed to him. He said he stopped checking his mail like a year ago cuz he pays all his bills online and never checks his mail cuz all it ever has is junk mail and ads. HAAAA. Time to chuck our mailbox key.

So, in an effort to do some minor catch up I spent some of my day canceling stuff that has grown obsolete for others like a decade ago or something.

• I canceled the newspaper. Yep, just today. We already reduced it to Fri-Sun, but even that was still not used enough to justify the expense.
• I canceled receiving several more of my paper bills- they only come via the net now.

I know. You're so proud. Look out world, I'm hip now.

For my next act, I'm going to make fuel for my car by recycling my pee.

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SNOW!!!!

I just took down my Christmas lights today.... in like 85 degree weather. Ridiculous. I tell you ridiculous. I miss Nor Cal in the winter so much. I miss rain, cold, seasons, and the chance to hit the slopes. I miss the powerhouse snow ski trips so much!

But thanks to some generous Christmas presents, we took the whole tribe to the snow and curbed my withdrawal a little! It was sooooo much fun. It had been such a long time since we'd been, that it was virtually a whole family first. Since we've been in San Diego for 5 years, I think TJ was the only one who even remembered going before. That is now all changed forever.

We decided to sled for one day, spent the night, and then went to Bear Valley to ski/snowboard on Tyler's 10 year old birthday! My dad skied, I boarded, TJ and Ty took lessons in the morning on snow boards and then I bonded with them on the bunny slope in the afternoon. Becky, Billy, and Jake all took 1/2 day lessons for skiing. Then Jake hit the slopes after with me while Becky and Billy called it a day and hit the lodge for hot chocolate with Shannon and my mom.

Oh man, what a great couple of days filled with fun memories. Here's some pics we snapped of our time. So dang blessed.

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