Read an interesting article today, it was in the Argus this morning. I read it while I was at the red light on Montague and Scott (yeah, its a loooong light...)

Its a story about 2 guys that are roommates at Stanford Hospital that are both waiting for a heart transplant. One guy was a father who owns a successful catering business in Newark. Another was a 2 time convicted robber from Los Angeles. The first guy's family visits him every day. The other guy only has security guards by his side 24-7.

A new heart came in, and the father had some other surgery done, so he was temporarily unavailable for the heart transplant. They gave the heart to the 2 time convicted robber.

How would you feel? I was really mad as I read up to that part. Why? The robber is in jail at the hospital. The operation costs upwards of a million dollars of taxpayers money. That doesn't make any sense. Why not give the heart to someone more deserving?

Then, as I read on, I realized how selfish I was. Who is to say who is more deserving? God has a plan for all of us, and maybe he has great plans for the robber, and thus letting him live. Is one life worth more than the other? I thought to myself. (No, not really) and no one knows what is going to happen in the future. Maybe this near-death experience will change the robber. Who knows? If I was in the father's shoes, would I be at peace with what happened? The father in the article put himself in the hands of God, and trusted God's decision. Am I able to do that?

What a humbling experience! I realized how un-deserving I am of God's grace. God had such a compassion for the human kind, and that He send His son to die for us, so that we can receive God's grace. Isn't that awesome? Also, it makes me realize that I need to fully trust in God's plan. To not worry about the future and do the best I can and put myself in His hands.

john

Hmmm. I had a pretty good weekend. Albeit it was a bit busy, but it was really good.

We started off Friday night with small group at our house, and there are just six of us. Its was nice because it was sort of an interesting setting, and we sat in a circle and sang songs and shared and prayed. It was a good time of fellowshipping, and I feel that I was calm and had a good night of sleep.

Then, Saturday morning, I fixed Liz's brake handle cover (that was chewed up by Cody the dog), and then we went to the Toyota dealer to check out their new Highlanders. They're really cool cars. Really popular, too. Its hard to get one because they're all still on order. Anyhow, we drove one and I think Liz is gonna get one, I guess its just a matter of price and the model. The highlander, eventhough it has a 4 cylinder engine, is much much more spirited than the Subaru was. It does look very nice, too.

The guy at the dealership tried to sell us a 4Runner as well. We drove it, and wasn't very impressed. Its an old design and needs a complete interior overhaul. The V6 was definitely more powerful, but the interior was just too plain.

Then we had dinner in the city at Luna Park (Great resturant!!!! and cheap, too!) and went to the Harmony Sweepstakes Acappella competition. The singings by the groups were incredible. They all had such beautiful voices... I wish I can sing like that. The highlight though, was running into my friend Lily. I haven't seen her since 1995! It was such an interesting situation. i was so glad that I ran into her. I've sorta been looking for her since we graduated, but was never able to. She was really glad to see me too, and she met Liz as well. It was neat to see how after all these years we can still talk like there is no tomorrow. Hahaha.

Sunday was church day, and Noel came back for a week cuz her hubby is in the bay area for training. Pretty cool that we got to see her and hang out a bit. We had yummy Thai food to end the evening. Hmmm. can't ask for a better weekend than that!

:-)
john

Had a good relaxing weekend....

We went test driving for Liz's new car, so we went to the Subaru dealer in San Jose to test drive the 2002 Outback. Boy was I disappointed. Maybe I am a bit spoiled, but I couldn't really feel the kick out of that engine. It was pretty sluggish. I felt the engine in my 93 Altima had more kick than the Subaru had. We're going to go around and test drive some more cars. Hopefully, there will be something both economical and nice our there.

You know, I've always liked wagons, for some reason. Outback is probably the nicest looking wagon out on the road these days. It looks rugged. And its not a SUV. I'm not a big fan of those SUVs. I think wagons look great, and they can haul lots and lots of stuff. Its practical, and I think the Outback looks really elegant, too. Its just a nice car over all. I wonder what the V6 LL Bean Edition feels like.... ?!?!?

k. back 2 work. :-)
john

Haven't blogged all week. hehehe :-)
Vegas was fun! We spend our time walking around all the casinos, going on the New Tork, New York roller coaster, went to the M&M Store (boring) and the Coca Cola store. It was a neat-o experience. I really enjoyed spending the time with Liz, and also I like the Star Trek Experience. That was awesome. That, and we had some Romulan Ale and a Core Breach, and sang Klingon battle songs with some friendly Klingons. yeah!

The lesson I learned from Vegas is that humans are very weak. Well, I guess I shouldn't generalize, but I am very weak. I couldn't stay away from the tables, and even though I won on the first day I lost it all on the 2nd and 3rd day. I guess I keep thinking that my luck can't be that bad, but Maybe it is that bad. Just gotta learn how to control myself. Usually, I try to avoid those places so I don't even have a chance to tempt myself...

This has been a long week. working very hard to get our board issues resolved. Still no luck. Well, we'll see what happens.

Got plane tickets to goto Orlando for $250 for 2 roundtrip from San Jose. Not bad at all. That will happen in May, as we goto DisneyWorld. I've never been there! should be fun.

My roommate has been in a car accident. Fell asleep at the wheel. Been praying for him and hope that he gets better soon.

Valentine's Day was fun! I went up to Lizzy's place and gave her a little Precious Moments Figurine titled "I will Never Let You Down". It was pretty neat, with the boy on the bottom and the girl on his shoulders. I thought it was appropriate because hopefully, I will never let Liz down. I want to be there to carry her through everything... Anyhow, she gave me a bear that she "made" and it was really cute. And it has a heart in it!

:-) nuts

Some break through today. Finally, I was able to trigger on the error of my PC Board and was able to take a look at the parity error. There seems to be some timing issues, but I can't tell what. I guess I will just wait until our hardware engineer comes back and let him figure it out. :-)

Today is a nice day. Only 1 more day of work before I am off to Vegas. I'm not terribly excited about Vegas, but VERY excited about going on vacation... And, with my favorite person too. :-)

You know, I realized that when you are stressed and under pressure, you often don't get a lot done. When I was debugging this parity error problem, I kept thinking about when it needs to be done and how little time I have to do it, and then I stress myself out and doesn't let my 2 brain cells do its work. However, I took a step back yesterday and stopped worring about when it was going to be done and all, and look how much progress I made! Yikes! Another lesson in life - "NO STRESS!" Its another one of those easy to say, hard to do, phrases. But its neat to discover one of the "true" meanings behind no stress - i.e. you productivity really goes up when you are not stressed!

nuts

*sigh*
I don't think I'm very smart. I've been trying to fix this PC board at work that has some timing issues for at least 3 weeks now. YIKES! Its just not so easy. I guess I wish I could be a miracle worker, but I am not.

Pinched a nerve the other day, or so I thought I did. Anyways, I have this sharp pain when I turn my head to a certain position. It was really bad on Saturday, a bit better today, and it still feels pretty bad today. Oh well....

Liz and I, along with my parents and my grandpa went to see the Peking Acrobats on Saturday. It was AWESOME! There were incredible acts of balance, and some incredibly soft bodies of the contortionists. It was incredible. I especially like the act with a girl riding a unicycle on a turning umbrella, and the 8 layers of chairs that are stacked with the guy balancing on it, and also the lady that juggled a big vase with her feet. Boy. The were scary! It was really really neat-o.

*sigh* back to work now. :-)
nuts

There appears to be some controversy over Friday night small groups.
At our church, we have a 'young adult' group. This group is made up of people that are in the mid-late 20s and early 30s. We meet on Friday nights to talk about how our work week was, and to do a little bible study...etc. Fellowship stuff.

Someone recently brought up a notion that we should meet 2x a month instead of every week. I'm very distraught by this. I don't understand. To me, meeting 2x a month is not considered a 'fellowship'. Its merely a 'gathering'. I guess in a sense I'm afraid of 'losing' the group that I goto for support.

Why would we want to meet 2x a week? Well, here are they reasons that were discussed through e-mail and my responses:
1. Its a chore to have to host small group at our house on Friday nights?
My response: Don't host it unless you want to.
2. I want my Friday nights to be free to relax after a hard working week?
My response: Don't need to come if you don't feel like coming. I goto the fellowship to relax....
3. Not enough people wants to go every week anyways?
My response: Why are we having small group again? its to support each other in the kingdom of God. So whether its 2 people or 20 people, its still fellowship, right?

I dunno. To me, these seem to be very simple questions, with very simple answers. I don't understand what the crying is all about.

What is a fellowship that meets 2x a month? Not much of one. To me, that means if something comes up on the week that we have small group then I won't get to see everyone for another whole month. It doesn't make any sense. Why do we goto church every week? Why not every other week? I know I don't have a perfect attendance record at small groups, cuz a lot of times my friends come up from LA and I don't get to see them very often.... But, no matter, small group should not discontinued because of that! It should be there for people to come and have a shoulder to lean on, a place for people to come and chat and share about the hardships of the working environment. Its tough enough working in the world by yourself.... Therefore, I signed up to host small group at my house. We'll see how things go from here!

john