I love the college calendar!…

So, a lot (not all, but a lot) of my work schedule is dependent upon the collegiate calendar … like when students are gone on breaks, it means some of my regular responsibilities don’t happen … For example, this week we get Thanksgiving break starting tomorrow.  So, this week I’m able to go home and spend some quality time with friends and family.

I can hardly believe that the semester is almost over. Only 2 weeks of classes left after Thanksgiving break, then Finals, then … Winter Break!

I have a lot of reading that I would like to accomplish over these breaks, so we’ll see how that goes.  My blog was actually selected to be part of a book review “blog tour” for Mark Batterson’s new book “Primal”  So, I’ll receive the book in the next week or so, read it and have to review it here sometime before Christmas.

There is so much to be thankful for this year.  Good health, awesome family, great friends, an amazing job/ministry.  So let’s hear it folks … what are the things you are most thankful for this year?

-E

P.S.  The new Phil Wickham cd is amazing …

Reading and listening..

It’s been a little bit since I’ve posted, and in an ongoing effort for personal/leadership growth I’ve been reading a lot.  I have a hefty stack of books that I’m trying to work my way through.

Here is what I’ve just finished and what I’m currently working on:

 

Discerning the Voice of God by Priscilla Shirer:

Compelled by Love by Ed Stetzer and Philip Nation

Working on these now:

Breaking the Missional Code by Ed Stetzer and David Putman

 

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

 

Listening to:

Not Guilty Anymore by Aaron Keyes

 

Catalyst Music Project by Various Artists

 

What are you reading/listening to?  And what have you been learning lately?

Reading/Listening

Okay, here’s attempt #1 at getting back onto a somewhat “regular” blog schedule from the Cape.

Took my long weekend to continue finish unpacking from the move, and to fit in my long training run (it was an 18 miler this weekend) … I can’t believe that the marathon is only a month away!  Still raising $ before the race to help benefit the ministry of World Vision to under-developed villages in Africa … if you’re interested helping let me know!

So, I thought I’d just give a quick update today with some things that I’ve been reading and listening to lately.  I’ve got a LARGE stack of books on my desk at home that I am looking forward to getting to, but need to get settled in to a little bit of a more regular schedule right now before I start too many of them!

So here’s the list:

Missional Renaissance by Reggie McNeal

It’s a great book that challenges your thinking on what the Church is and should be and gets you to thinking about how to live a missional life.

Samson and the Pirate Monks by Nate Larkin

A book for men on authentic brotherhood, challenging men to find community with one another where you can be completely real, completely honest and free to be who God created you to be.

Listening:

This is my current favorite:

Jimmy Needham  “Not Without Love”

I’ve heard some of his other stuff, but this one has been on repeat since I got it.  This may be a terrible description, but sort of like the Jason Mraz of Christian music? … whatever it is, I like it!

That’s what I’ve got for now… what are you reading or listening to?  Any recommendations?

-E

Completely random, free blog advertisement on Alphainventions.com

Well, I know a few of you out there actually read this, and an even smaller number of those that read this actually have a blog of their own, but I thought I’d share this link with you.

I don’t have a huge following on my blog, but I do have an average of 40 or so hits a day, with my largest traffic day (until yesterday) being 75 hits.  As I was managing my blog yesterday I noticed that my visit count for the day was well over 100 (and ended up at 146) hits and I started to look and see if I could find out why . . . it wasn’t surely wasn’t that I had written anything profound.  I noticed that the large majority of those hits were coming having been referenced by a website called:

www.alphainventions.com

It is a site that posts on a rotation, blogs for you to read that are being updated in real time, and leaves those blogs on that rotation for an unspecified amount of time.  Let me say that I don’t have any idea how my blog got put onto that rotation, or how they “found” me, but they did and it doubled the highest day I had for traffic on my blog since I started.  On alphainventions.com you can also “post” your blog onto the rotation for free and it will stay on there until it gets booted by another blogger that is posting their blog.

So, all of this to say, if you have a blog, and would be interested in getting more traffic free of charge, you might try out alphainventions.com.

-Eric