Incredible Animal of the Week

The Tomato Frog - Amazing.

When threatened, the tomato frog inflates its body. If the predator grabs the tomato frog in its mouth, the frog's skin secretes a thick, whitish substance that gums up the predator's teeth and mouth, causing the predator to release the frog to free up its mouth. The gummy substance clears out of predator's mouth after several days; it contains a toxin that occasionally causes allergic reactions in humans.

I saw the frog do this on Animal Planet and it was amazing. The white stuff is exactly like glue. The snake that tries to eat it goes away with it's mouth stuck shut for up to 2 days! More proof that there has to be a God. Nature is way too incredible for their not to be. Scientists should be the greatest theologians in the world.

Great Band Names, Not Great Music

I've been noticing that many bands that have great names have pretty bad music. Here goes:
The Arcade Fire
The Rapture
The Fiery Furnaces

On the other hand you have bands with really bad names who make good music.
Clem Snide
Grandaddy
The Weakerthans

It's a weird phenomenon. It's tough to come up with a good band name. Apparently some bands spend more time coming up with a cool name than on their music.

Christmas Vacation

Only a few more days and I'm outta here! Woohoo! Can't wait to be back in Illinois with my fiance and family and the snow. There's snow there right? Looking at my blog I can see that I've certainly had enough lists for the end of the year. Done with that.

Yesterday was my last official day at Mosaic. I preached yesterday which went alright. The night service was a little rough however because Gregg and Glenn and I were talking about how you could ever use a certain word that I won't disclose in the sermon. So at this point we were laughing quite a bit and in a silly mood. When I was speaking I was at a pretty serious point in the message when I see Gregg standing in the doorway at the back of the auditorium and give me a goofy grin and wave. At this point I start laughing right in the middle of this story and lose everyone. They are all just looking at me like, "What's wrong with this dude?" So I said, "I'm sorry guys, Gregg just made a goofy face and made me laugh" at which point Gregg started rolling around in the hallway on the floor along with Glenn because they were laughing so hard. Oh man, we can't be around each other without laughing. Our prayer meetings always get out of control and now we can't even preach without losing it. Oh, it was a fun last Sunday. I will miss it.

Most Anticipated Releases of 2005

I am hoping this is going to be a better year for music than 04. It was pretty rough. Any year that Franz Ferdinand have the best record and are referred to as the "saviors of rock" you know it's a pretty poor year for music. So anyway, here are the releases that I am looking forward to hearing. In order of my excitement:

Denison Witmer - titled "Are You A Dreamer?" Spring '05
Weezer - Spring '05
Brand New - Currently Recording
The Stills - Sometime 2005
The Postal Service - Not sure but definitely 2005
Counting Crows - please be less produced than Hard Candy! Please???
OK Go - Soon

I'm hoping that on top of these there will be some creative new bands that come out this year that aren't just a copy of what's cool right now. For further discussion on this see my post "I hate the Strokes for doing this to music." Don't try to argue either because I'm right. If you don't believe me then you can just go out, buy a vintage suit and tie, grow your hair out until it's real messy and go play some garage rock.

A Few Unsupported, Subjective Statements

-Oceans Twelve - Sucks Big Time

-People who email me and spell my city Man Hatten - Not too bright.

-Straight Plan for the Gay Man on Comedy Central - Genious

-www.heebmagazine.com - The Jewish Relevant Magazine

-Not being able to think of more than four subjective statements - just as bright as the guy who spelled Manhattan wrong.

Top 5 Concerts of 2004

I don't know why but I love making lists, especially at the end of the year. Every magazine does it and I usually am not satisfied with them. Case in point. Greatest guitarists of all time by Rolling Stone. #9. Jack White. #41. Eric Clapton. #73. Les Paul Are you serious? Jack White? That almost made me puke. Anyway, I'm sure people could care less what the top five concerts I've seen this year are but I'm going to tell you anyway because I write down everyone I see and I've seen 35 bands perform this year! Man, imagine all that money I could have saved right now. Crap. Anyway, here goes:

1. Death Cab For Cutie - Bowery Ballroom
2. The Decemberists - Bowery Ballroom
3. OK Go - Mercury Lounge
4. Ben Folds - Bowery Ballroom (this was cool because it was a private show - WooHoo)
5. Pedro the Lion - Northsix

Honorable Mentions: Blindside - CBGB's

Worst Show of the Year: Starflyer 59 (they played with tracks!)

Anyone see anybody cool this year?

12 Favorite Crows

August and Everything After:
Round Here
Perfect Blue Buildings
Sullivan Street (I think about this every time I walk by Sullivan Street here in the village)
Raining in Baltimore

Recovering the Satellites:
Long December (seriously, is there a more beautiful song out there?)
Walkaways (the best 1 minute song you'll ever hear)
Goodnight Elisabeth
Daylight Fading
Children in Bloom

Hard Candy:
Black and Blue
Holiday in Spain

Across a Wire:
Angels of the Silences (Storytellers)

Notice how many selection are from This Desert Life. Hahahaha.

Out of all of those my favorite Counting Crows song of all time would be......................
Round Here - I was only about 13 when this came out but it made me go, "Whoa, music is powerful". This is one of the songs that really made me get interested (addicted) to music.

Changes

It's weird making a transition in life as we all know by this point. In three weeks I will be done with Mosaic Manhattan and begin work on another church plant that doesn't have a name yet www.manhattanpartnership.org. It's going to be hard to leave. I've been here for almost three years and was the first person on staff with Gregg. Everything the church has been through, i have experienced right along with it. It's hard to think and plan for the next year with the staff knowing that I will not be around to see any of it. I know that this is what needs to happen right now. I've learned a lot in the past 3 years at Mosaic and now I feel like I can be a bigger part of this next church plant being a better leader and having made many mistakes that we will not need to repeat again. It's an exciting time but also kind of a sad time. There have been so many good times here and have had so many laughs with everyone it's going to be hard to say goodbye to all of that.

Dustin's 2004 What The F Award.......

We Have a Winner

Goes to Kings of Leon for their new release Aha Shake Heartbreak. I listened to this album tonight and I don't know what to say. I can honestly say that I liked their first effort Youth and Young Manhood. I thought it was pretty cool but i don't know what this album is all about. I guess I can say i like a few songs but some of these songs sound like....well, just download the song Day Old Blue and I will guarantee you that you will laugh out loud. You might think you like it as it begins. I thought it was good and then the chorus happened and I am speechless. Can't wait to hear your response.

The Radical Reformission

I read Mark Driscoll's book a few weeks ago. This is a thought provoking and laugh out loud book in places. The most impressive aspect is that you can really hear his heart in this book. I think he gets it. I love the whole chapter that precedes this short quote. He's very honest about his own self righteousness right before this section, i hope you get a chance to read the whole thing.

"Self-righteousness has so seeped into American Christianity that being a missionary to one's neighbors is easily overlooked because of the sickness of our faith. How sick are we when the most popular books among American Christians are about how to get blessed by praying a small section of Old Testament Scripture like a pagan mantra, and about the Rapture, as if the goal of the Christian life were to get more junk and leave this trailer park of a planet before God's tornado touches down on all the sinners? Only through repentant eyes will we see that God has a plan, by the power of the gospel of grace, to build a community of transformed people."