Blogging from the NYMC.

Apparently I'm part of the "official" group of bloggers from this weekend's National Youth Ministry Conference in Columbus, Ohio. Josh Griffin has the whole list on his blog, where I previously made this short, simple statement:

Rob C
i’ll be there but no guarantees on how much blogging or twittering i’ll be doing…

In any case, I'll try to post a few things during the weekend. I'm going to be doing some behind-the-scenes type work, so I don't know how many sessions or workshops I'll be attending. In any case, I'm looking forward to the weekend, seeing a bunch of youth ministry friends, making some new connections, and seeing God do some cool stuff in people's lives.

My apologies...

...for not blogging these last two weeks. No real reason for the silence. But I accept your forgiveness for my absence.

Joys and pains of writing.

I'm the first to admit that I'm a word geek. Yes, I'm a geek in other ways (and for a few months of my life I was a Greek, but that's a different story), but my greatest geekiness is found in the area of words.

If you regularly visit this blog, you know I've written very little over the last couple of months. The silence fascinates me more than it fascinates you, because I enjoy writing, I love words, and I'm always full of thoughts and opinions.

Last week in Oregon I did more journaling and writing, which seems to have unleashed a desire to write again. I regularly use twitter (see the top right corner of my blog for recent updates), which I find to be an awesome form of micro-blogging.

Anyway, I guess this is my declaration of intent: I intend to write here more frequently, and to reactivate other areas of writing in my life.

Am I a blogging failure?

Over the last few weeks, my blogging patterns have been weak. Horribly weak, one might say. Why has this happened? Let's ponder the possibilities.

1. Rob is spending too much time writing pithy messages on twitter; he's unable to complete thoughts longer than 140 characters.

2. Rob is so enamored with his most recent Moleskine purchase that he feels compelled to only write on physical paper using ink. Not pencil. Ink. Pencil is for wimps who can't commit to an idea.

3. Rob is spending too much time watching TV, now that he can catch new episodes of The Office, 30 Rock, and, um, well, what else does he watch...

4. Rob is overwhelmed with the project of re-creating his church's database from scratch because his senior pastor was tired of sending birthday cards to dead people and anniversary cards to divorced couples, so Rob got the job of using new software and starting from Square One.

5. Rob is using all his spare time coming up with excuses on why he's slow on getting editing projects back to his friends at Simply Youth Ministry. No wait, that doesn't sound very professional.

So pick whichever excuse you like. All of them are right and wrong, in an Obi Wan-explaining-to-Luke-about-his-father-and-truth-from-a-certain-point-of-view way.

The prayers of my blog.

We just wrapped up our church staff meeting, and in his closing prayer, our senior pastor prayed specifically for each of us. When praying for me, he said, "God, we ask that you would answer all the prayers of his blog," which made all of us laugh.

I know Kansas DID win the national championship last night in men's basketball. And according to at least one online article today, some people believe God played a role in helping the Jayhawks win.

I'm not a huge proponent of the "God lets Christians win" theory. If two Christian QBs face off in the Super Bowl, only one can win. Does God play favorites? Does God have a big coin in heaven that He tosses to pick the winner?

Certainly I believe God gives us the strength to do our best, to excel, to perform well. Besides, didn't we all learn years ago that it's not if we win but how we play the game?

Then again, I'd be a bit unhappy today if Kansas had lost last night. So maybe I still have some learnin' to do...

Have you googled yourself lately?

I hadn't googled myself in quite some time, so I decided to do it, and I was surprised by the results! When I typed in "rob cunningham" in the search engine, my own blog was the first hit. Remarkable! Last time I did it, my blog was the 13th result, so apparently I'm moving up in the world...

My dad now has a blog.

As I sit here, realizing my recently abysmal blogging patterns, it's worth noting that my dad has launched his own blog in honor of the year 2008. Or something like that.

He and my stepmom live in Iowa, which today is the center of the political universe. Tomorrow, of course, no one will give a flying leap about Iowans' views on presidential candidates. But today is the day faithful voters go caucus (apparently it's a verb, not just a noun) and pick their state's nominees for both major political parties. If you care who my dad's supporting, you can visit his blog.

Anyway, it should be interesting to see how consistently my dad maintains his blog. I've done a horrible job of late, faithful reader, but perhaps I can get back on the wagon. Or off the wagon. I always get that one mixed up...

My friend and blogging inspiration Josh Griffin (seriously, he's the one who encouraged me to take up this "habit" couple years ago) recommended that I consume energy drinks like Rockstar to inspire me and my writing. But I think energy drinks are of the devil. Like dancing.

Maybe this is why I have few readers.

I found this "test" over on YS Marko's blog and thought I'd find out how "difficult" of a blog I write. Yikes! For a guy who used to work at a newspaper (4th-grade writing level, they say), I was surprised by the verdict that ...



Congrats for reading! You must be smart!

So is this evidence that I need to get off my butt and finally move forward with a graduate degree?

Post No. 36

Wow, 36 posts in a 31-day month. Sometimes I impress even myself.

Great night tonight. Lower numbers in some of our midweek programs because of Halloween, but a great turnout for our Trunk or Treat event for the kids. Our children's pastor and her team did a great job with an event we haven't tried before. Didn't really know if we'd have a good turnout, but we did.

And tomorrow, we move into November. Two months left in 2007. Wow.

Why have I blogged so much?

So I've finally broken the average of "one blog a day" for the month of October. This is the first time I've ever written more than 30/31 posts in a single month. Why?

1. Harvest Festival
This was a big event, had a lot of excitement and activity and involvement, so it was easy material

2. New job
I try to send one or two emails each week to our worship team, and I've started carrying over some of those thoughts into this space, too

3. More thinking and reading
I guess I've been doing a lot more thinking about ministry and writing and ideas and other stuff, so some of it is bound to spill over here

4. Greece trip
I didn't really do lots of blogging while in Greece, but I did lots of journaling, so I had plenty of material to share -- mostly funny stuff

5. Family inquiries
Last month, lots of friends and family were asking me what was up with the blog because I wasn't posting much

My day just keeps gettin' better.

Sweet! I just checked YSMarko's blog, and I won his most recent "photo in need of a caption" contest. Awesome. Now I just gotta figure out which Youth Specialties book I want as my prize (quite ironic, now that my job description has changed).

Gotta return to my blogging ways.

I only blogged six times in September. Yes, I was out of the country for two weeks, but I apparently lacked the writing energy to post my thoughts. I sure hope Josh doesn't disown me as a blogging friend...

Average mediocrity.

Once again, a month will close without my posting at least one thought per day average. I've yet to hit that mark. Some friends seem to flow forth with great brilliance each day. Yet I do not. So for now, I'm settle for my mid-20 output each month. Maybe I'll have more to say in my new role...

Updated profile.

I just realized my profile still said I was the youth pastor at my church. Seeing how I've now had my final youth events, programs, classes and service with the students, it was time to "upgrade" the title.

While there, I opted for a new question, too.

BLOGGER ASKS THIS:
"Do you believe that forks are evolved from spoons?"

ROB ANSWERS THIS:
"No. More like intelligent re-design."

Sometimes my witticism amazes even me.

Me and my labels.

I still think I have too many labels for my blog. But interestingly, my list of labels here bears a lot of resemblance to my filing system in my office. Every now and then, I'll create a new folder to hold some material -- only to discover weeks later that I already HAD created a folder for that subject, leaving me with duplicate folders and wasted energy trying to find stuff.

Often I'll tell people I'm a failed perfectionist. My filing system proves it. Would Matt McGill say I'm mentally weak?

Too many labels?

I was just looking at the right-hand side of my blog, and I noticed that I have lots of labels for my entries. I mean, LOTS of labels. More labels than I can recall seeing on most other people's blogs. Various theories to explain this:

1. I cover such a breadth of subjects that a myriad labels must be used.

2. I'm so disorganized that I can't logically arrange subject matters.

3. I use my labels as sub-subtopic identifiers, instead of higher-level identifiers.

Or maybe all three are correct. Dunno.

Blogging patterns.

I've been trying to figure out why I struggle to blog frequently when I'm working real-life hours. When I spent a week+ at my mom's house, I was churning out 2, 3, even 4 posts in a single day. None of them will win Pulitzer Prizes, mind you, but I at least felt I had something to say.

Now I'm back at work, in the office regularly, meeting with leaders and kids. I'm back into routine -- and I've been silent here all week. Do I spend time in front of the computer? Of course. Are there interesting anecdotes from my life? Probably. Do I somehow have less to say when I work than when I don't? I dunno.

Very weird. Maybe I need a shrink's couch to help me figure this out...