Pittsburgh visit :-P

The length of time between this post and my previous one indicates well the preoccupation of my time in the last two weeks with work, school, travels/hanging out, and recording. At last I am taking as short a time as possible to jot down the weekend before this past one.

January 27-29th, 2006
I was finally home for a weekend, after having been gone seemingly for months. I made up for my absence by hanging out with the Pittsburgh youth all Friday night and all afternoon Saturday, and all afternoon Sunday. Friday night Daniel and Sarah had organized a dinner at Eat 'n' Park, which ended up having 14 diners. I mostly got to catch up on things with Justin, get to know Jess and her friend Steph, who are relatively knew to PChOP, and catch up on the vibes of the YPCG-type group, in which I was once immersed. My respect for Daniel and Justin has deepened, and I learned more of my own limitations and pride. We hung out at EnP for a long time, were frustrated in our plans to go bowling, and ended up filling the Calano's living room till past midnight. Playing cards, playing guitar, doing push-ups, catching up, and enjoying fun company all combined to make this a rock 'n' roll evening. (I sound like an ad here, gosh!)

Saturday at 1:30 Daniel and I hit Quinlisk Park for frisbee. Yay for ultimate! The turnout was fairly light (from three to five per team), but the quality of play was excellent, the weather was GORGEOUS, the field wasn't too muddy, and I really had a lot of fun. Except Nate just couldn't get his wind, so we were sorta down a player :-( But I stopped the unstoppable Justin Harvey a couple times, and even made one catch myself, which was gratifying. After pounding ourselves on the turf in the quest for the disc we piled into cars and drove to Chick-fil-A, where Matt Q and Steve Schuch were working. We got cheap food from sweet coupons and sat around eating and talking and switching tables and sharing more semi-banal but still enjoyable conversation. Finally Daniel and I dragged ourselves back home. My knees held up admirably to the all-out game I played on them, but my leg muscles whined at me for the next 4 days. No problem, man--I'll take muscle soreness any day over stupid unexplained joint pain.

Saturday night was touched with the hand of God. Mom and Dad were at a potluck with Dad's men's group's couples, Daniel was at "The Importance of Being Earnest" with a bunch of folks, and Mike Quinlisk came over and helped me record drums for the punk song I wrote the day before. I was bursting at the seams to get it recorded, and with Mike at the helm of the computer I was able to sit at the drums and just play and play and take and take until we got it right. In two hours we had genuinely satisfactory drums for the entire song. I was ecstatic! It is SO much easier to record with another person! Oy. That night I stayed up way late and recorded all the bass for the song, too--working through it and getting the bass part to a level of technical correctness that made the song sound real, not like a lame basement recording. WOW, man! This is what happens when God is behind a recording project! Seriously.

Sunday I played drums at church (which went very well), listened to Joel's great message about Jesus being the only true source of help, and then headed to the Quinlisks with my men's group for lunch and prayer. Both were enjoyable and profitable. Daniel was at "The Point of the Spear" with a group of his peeps, and Ryan and Christa (newly engaged! *giggles*) were hangin' at the Q's. So I hung around, plunked guitar, and, with a violent start, remembered the go-kart sitting in their garage! So Mike and I dragged it out and I spent a euphoric 30 minutes fulfilling my heretofore unrealized childhood dream of driving a go-kart. SO sweet! When you're that low to the ground, even 10mph feels fast. Ahhh :-)

Finally Daniel got back, we toodled around some more, and eventually left and went home. Quite a weekend, and quite startlingly filled with activities. I was very glad to be able to catch up with folks here, and to record my song, and to play frisbee, and to spend time with the cool and friendly folks of God's church.

--Clear Ambassador