The Wisdom of Fat Pat

If this post was a Quentin Tarantino movie, I’m sure it would start out with me cowering in my Mom and Dad’s shower.  As the camera pans out, you would realize that not only am I not alone, but I am also fully clothed.  In fact, I am more than fully clothed.  The seat of my sweatpants is stuffed with toilet paper, pillows, and a hard back book.  Three of my brothers are with me and we are trying to jockey for the coveted position of furthest back in the corner of the shower while making sure we didn’t lose any of the padding in our pants.  You see, Dad was home and we knew what was coming.

6 hours prior to Dad getting home:The four of us kids (I was probably about 8 at the time so my brothers would have been 6, 10, and 12) were at a friends house down the street where we found a fun way to spend a summer day.  It basically consisted of calling our house every five minutes or so and when my brother Pat answered the phone, we would say, “Fat Pat, fat Pat, fatty fat fat Pat” and then hang up.  This went on for about an hour or so before Pat became wise to our little game, and stopped answering the phone.  Hmmm…now what?  It looked like we had to take the action to him.

4 hours prior to Dad getting home: We were now riding our bikes in front of our house singing at the top of our lungs, “Fat Pat, fat Pat, fatty fat, fat Pat” (it really did have a good ring to it). We were yelling it as loud as we could with no reaction from our brother, or at least so we thought.  Out of nowhere, he came flying out the door.  He had fire coming out of his eyes and was going to physically destroy any brother that he caught.  For a heavy kid, he was pretty fast but out of sheer terror we peddaled as fast as our little legs would allow and all luckily escaped. 

2 hours before Dad got home (which meant exactly 2 hours and 30 seconds before Dad took off his belt): We were at the park regrouping.  We already went back to our friends house and grabbed whatever items we could stuff our pants with.  Come to think of it, they weren’t even our pants.  Luckily, our friend knew we were in for a serious beating and was nice enough to loan us pants to stuff.  We grabbed whatever we could and headed to the park.  Once we were there, we discussed our options:  We could run away from our house forever. We thought maybe we could just go live at the local arcade, but then remembered we were a poor family and living at an arcade while not having any money would be torture.   We opted for a less wise idea.

10 minutes before Dad got home: We went home.  Pat was gone and our thought was that if we could get our spanking from Mom, it wouldn’t hurt as much and we could fake up enough tears so Dad would think we had already learned our lesson.  One mistake: I forgot to take the hardback book out of my pants before my Mom spanked me.  That was one spanking that really did hurt Mom more than it hurt me, and somehow I was in even more hot water than ever.  It was time to go hide in the shower.

Well since this isn’t a Quentin Tarantino movie, you’ll never know that long Summer day ended. The point of this was to share the wisdom of my brother Pat (he dropped the “Fat” part and now just goes by Pat).  Pat has always been wise.  He is one of those Christians that actually does a pretty good job of walking the walk.  He and his wife played a big part in me becoming a believer.  They saw me leading the downhill slalom race to “H E double hockey sticks.”  They could have shunned me as the sinner I was and went happily about their Christian lives.  Instead they invited me to Church.  Not once, but several times.  If their wasn’t something different about how they were living their lives, I would have never even accepted their invitations to what I thought was their “hokie Church,” but there was something different.  So I checked it out. 

Pat is a better fishermen than me.  Not fishing as in the local lake fishing (heck…he is pretty girly when it comes to this kind of fishing…he won’t even put his own worm on the hook), but fishing as Jesus said to Peter and Andrew, “Follow me, and I’ll make you fishers of men.”  Pat is wise here in that he knows his limitations: He is Pat and God is God.  He doesn’t confuse the two.  Me, I’m proned to confuse the two.  If this was still a fishing analogy, you could say that I usually eat the bait and then stick the hook in the fish’s eye.  God wants to use me, but he doesn’t need to use me. God is God, and Fat Tom is Fat Tom.

So, in his good fisherman way, Pat shared some more wisdom with me yesterday.  “You know” he said, “maybe you shouldn’t do your blog everyday.”  What? He, along with my brother Tim, was probably my biggest promoter.  Oh…I got it…now he was getting jealous.  I mean, on a really good day my audience had gotten up to about 5 people, and old Pat was getting jealous. “Wise?” Ha!  He’s no hoot owl!   Well, that was just fine with me, I never really liked the guy anyway (did I tell you he won’t even put his own worm on his hook?).

Well, after sleeping on it, I think I might be getting what Pat was trying to tell me.  Remember my priorities.  God first, Family second, blog third.  Pat probably knows that as I type this, my one year old is trying to swim in our toilet.  There’s nothing wrong with me trying to blog (I’m sure there is plenty wrong with the actual blog), but if it comes at the expense of one of the higher priorities, then I’m no longer glorifying God. So..and please hold your applause here…you might be seeing less of your Fat Blogger buddy, but just know that when you least expect it, I’ll be posting another blog entry (and that one might even be good!).  

Fellowship…it’s not just for breakfast anymore!

Thursday mornings are quickly becoming one of my favorite times of the week.   I wake up early, grab my Bible, and join about 200 other men at the weekly Men’s Bible Study at my church.   The format is usually similar every week: we sing, we pray, the Pastor speaks on a subject, and then in the final 5-10 minutes the men at the table speak amongst ourselves about the subject of the day.  It works out very nicely, because there are usually about 6 or 7 guys at the table so it leaves us a little less than a minute and a half that we each get to speak.  Actually, we usually talk for about 9 minutes about meaningless stuff, and when we know there is about a minute left, we basically mumble our 10 second opinion on the subject.

Well, since last week there was a holiday on the day we usually had our weekly Men’s Bible Study, I suggested that four of us go have a Fellowship breakfast on Wednesday.  Now I know you women out there are thinking “No big deal.”  WRONG!!!  You know your annual visit to the women’s doctor? That is about the men’s equivalent of a full hour of a guy just talking to other guys.  No sports on the tube…come to think of it…no tube period, just basically some guys sitting around looking at each other wondering if they should fake a seizure so they don’t have to risk sharing their feelings with other guys.  That stuff might work on Dr. Phil, but in real like men would rather have a root canal that go beneath the surface with other guys. 

So here is basically how it went at our breakfast: We started with the usual, “Did you see the game last night?”  Just an FYI to the women, whether or not there really was a game last night is irrelevant.  This is the safest place we have to start so all male conversations begin this way.  We then made our smooth transition to “How’s work going?”  This one is a little more personal so we usually make sure we only use one word to answer.  As men, we get to choose between, “good,” “fine,” “okay” or even “sucks.”  You know how you women wish we would really just sit and listen as you share your feelings with us but we never do, well that is how we listen to each other when it comes to these one word answers.  The trick is if the friend before you says “fine,” you have to pick another answer.  If you accidently say the same thing as another guy, the rest of the guys start questioning your sexual preference.  This breakfast was going okay but I noticed that we went through the first two staple questions before we even had our menus.  Great…now what? 

I could feel a bead of sweat start to form on my brow and our waiter was nowhere in sight.  I knew I had two choices: I could pull the fire alarm forcing an immediate evacuation or I could just start yelling, “Shark!  Everyone out of the water!”  Hmmm…. there were two problems with this: 1: to my immediate right was about 6 tables pushed together full of firefighters and 2. as I looked around Denny’s, I realized that the other half of the restaurant would have believed there really was a shark and swam so fast out of there that their oxygen tanks would have been left behind.  Where in the heck was that waiter? Luckily, I was able to very calmly  jump up and grab us some menus myself.   Phew!  Close call, but now that we had our menus we could just hide our faces in them until the waiter came. 

 ”How’s the Family?” someone asked right after we ordered our meal.  I couldn’t believe my ears.  What was he thinking jumping right to the third and final question so soon?  We could have killed almost the entire 30 minutes before our food arrived with really deep things like, “Eggs are good.”  “Yeah, I hear Peyton Manning eats eggs.” “Really? Did you see the game last night.”

Instead, we had a real conversation.  We shared our struggles, our hopes, and even some fears, and I don’t think a single one word answer was given.  We read a couple of passages from the Bible and shared how they related to our own lives.  We talked about things like protecting our witness, honoring our wives, and we closed with agreeing to pray for each other.  Actually, maybe we should have closed with that, but instead one of the guys had to throw out a challenge.  “Twice this week” he started”lets try to serve our wives while expecting nothing in return.”  “And” he continued, “we cannot tell each other what we did so we don’t try to compete with each other on this.”  I barely heard this second part because I was already thinking of how I could out-serve these suckers.  “So is everyone up for the challenge…serve your wife in two ways this week while expecting nothing in returning and don’t tell each other what we did” he recapped.  Okay I heard the whole thing this time.   How stupid!  This is why men don’t do fellowship.  By the way, it is 4 days later and I’m at negative 5 on the selflessly serving my wife scale….SHARK!!!!

Spam I am

Well, it has been almost two weeks now since I started my “new thing” and it has been somewhat of an emotional roller coaster.  Here is some of what I have experienced this past week: I’ve been told that this blog is a “pile of verbage” (which strangely enough, I think was a compliment), that this was ”pee your pants funny” (can’t say I’ve gotten that compliment before…but I love it), I actually had a couple of people request that I release more of my “book” (which I’ll have to use to torture you with in the future), and lastly I was told to put some pants on (but that had nothing to do with my Blog).  Yes, you could say my first two weeks as a blogger has offered many lessons. Unfortunately, I’m too thick headed  to actually learn any of them.  So instead of answers, I’m just left with a lot of questions.  Questions like: What’s a widget? How about a Blogroll?  How do I get music on my Blog?  Should  I put music on this blog?  And most importantly, HOW IN THE HECK DO I GET PEOPLE TO READ THIS DARN THING???  And if I can get them to read it once, how do I get them to come back and read it again?  Sure I could try to write witty and sometimes insightful postings, but there’s just got to be an easier way!

Well, for about a day, I thought I had arrived.  It was the day that I got my first comment.  This wasn’t just any old comment from a friend or family member, this was a real comment.  I felt like Ralphie’s father in the movie, “The Christmas Story.”  Remember when he won that contest and got his “Major Award?”  As he stood there reading the box beaming with pride, “Ragile…it must be Italian.”  Well, that was me as I excitedly clicked to see my first comment. 

Apparently the website topbloodpressure.com (or something like that) was going to put part of one of my posts on its site.  I was a little concerned because they took an excerpt out of my “book” and it was definitely out of context.  It said something along the lines of, “when the nurse comes over start moaning and groaning very loudly.”  Gosh…was my witty manuscript being put on some sex site, I wondered for about two seconds?  “Who cares?” I finally reasoned, “I was being published!” 

After excitedly showing my wife my great news, re-reading the comment about 20 times, then makin my wife re-read it another 20 times, my mind started to wander.  Wow!  I’m going to be a star.  Maybe I’ll be the “Christian Dave Barry.”  Wait a minute…I was thinking too small.  Maybe Dave Barry would start being the secular “Fat Tom. ”  What do I do first and where do I even start?  Do I get an Agent?  Should I start practicing my signature for all the people that were surely going to want my autograph.  Should I start writing some acceptance speech for my nomination of wittiest man alive? Can my Mom and I wear matching pink sweats to the award ceremony?  Could this lead to me doing endorsements? Maybe a plug for nose hair trimmers?  Maybe, just maybe, this could lead me to my boyhood dream of being a plus sizes model! I tell you my mind was racing with my delusions of grandeur.

That lasted for almost exactly 24 hours (just long enough for me to inform my wife that I was going to trade her in for a woman that actually enjoyed reading my blog, but luckily before I could tell my boss where he could stick it).  I went into my Blog the next day expecting some doctors from around the world to ask me for blood pressure advice, or for perverts around the world to expand on my recent titillating post that contained the words “moaning and groaning”, or at the very least an all out war between NBC and FOX fighting for who was going to pay me the most to be a scab writer during the writers strike (which network has Ellen?  That’s a dude I can relate to considering I too have a doggy and still look good in the Miami Vice jackets). I didn’t see any of the above so I scoured the whole blog site and found a couple of other interesting things: 1. A “Blog Stats” category- Which confirmed that I only actually had two readers so two of the four I thought I had are liar, liar, pants on fire, and 2. a tool that automatically blocks Spam on my Blog.

Most of us are already in the 21st century so I probably don’t need to clarify that I’m not talking spam as in the secret ingredient Mom used to add to her tofu lasagna.  I’m talking about spam from the annoying email spam.  I shouldn’t really call it annoying as it is pretty useful.  I mean…sure I want fuller breasts (what man doesn’t?). If I’m going to be stuck with these manboobs anyway, I may as well get them as full as possible but will it interfere with all that viagra I am taking and can I pay for them with the proceeds of the overseas lottery I apparently just won after I send them my processing fee?  Is that the kind of spam they were talking about blocking on my blog? Well, I clicked on the link to show me the spam that had been blocked.  All 8 were  random “websites” that supposedly put excerpts from my blog onto their site.  It became apparent that my first real comment that I was sure was going to turn into a reality show with me and Flavor Flave, was spam.    I was crushed. Within 24 hours I went from being the father on The Christmas Story to being that guy who just had his plain foiled by those pesky kids on Scooby Doo. 

How could this happen? Oh yeah…the P word again.  The Bible tells us in Proverbs 11:2 that “When PRIDE comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.”  How many times am I going to have to learn that lesson?  Wait a minute…I guess since this was probably at least the 1000th time God has given me the opportunity to learn it, I probably just need to actually learn it just once.  Instead of learning the lesson from God’s word, I fall for all the devil’s spam in my life. You don’t need to read the Bible, your funnier than any of those guys that wrote that anyway.  Was that woman just checking you out? It looks like that sit-up you did last month is really paying off.  You don’t need to listen to your wife she can’t control you.  Wait a minute, that last one wasn’t the devil, that’s me.  Daniel 11:32 says that “With flattery he will corrupt… but the people who know their God fill firmly resist him.”  Know my God???  With just a little bit of false pride and flattery I was about to trade my God for the three headed female version that worship in India just because I thought it might triple my chance of landing a Dreyer’s commercial.  Oh well, I’m an idiot.  Actually, I guess I’m just like the typical person out there (only a little fatter).  That’s why we need God in our lives because when we try to do it on our own we end up failing miserably.  I’ll learn this lesson someday…honestly.  In the meanwhile… any of you dudes have a bra I can borrow?

Fat Tom Turkey says Gobble, Gobble…

Did you know that I was this close to becoming a Buddhist?  I figured any religion that was going to make statues in my image I least owed it to them to bet my salvation on.  So, I turned part of my mullet into a ponytail and shaved the rest of my head.  I borrowed the tambourine out of some kids music set, stole some flowers out of my neighbor’s garden, and headed to the airport.  It probably only took me 200 Hari Krishna dances to realize that I even screwed up becoming a Buddhist. 

By the time I realized my blunder, a new movie was out starring my twin brother and Morgan Freeman.  They were both detectives and were hunting down a serial killer that chose his victims based on the seven deadly sins.   The movie was called “Seven,” and for probably more than seven years, this become the standing nickname for me and my college buddies.  What can I say, I wasn’t a believer yet and based the important decision of where I was going to go to college on where it ranked in Playboy’s list of top party schools.  So what most people took about 4 or 4.5 years to complete, it took me seven (and that was just to get out of the junior college). 

Anyway, one of the seven deadly sins was gluttony and the movie showed  my body double laying naked on a table and the image was forever burned in my fat skull.  This was what my buddies and I were referring to with the nickname of Seven.  So here is basically how it went… One of us would be dancing with a woman or otherwise being smooth, and the other guys would come up and make sure the woman knew that she was dancing with the guy from Seven.  She would think it was a joke on that the buddy she was dancing with thinking he was Brad Pitt and give us a gratuitous laugh.  We would then make sure we clarified the joke for her (I think the guy that said if you have to explain your joke it isn’t funny never tried to explain a joke over and over again to a stranger on the dance floor while she did the macarena).  That should answer the question as to why we were such a hit with the ladies.

So on this day of gluttony, I think I’ll publicly declare that I’m going to lose some weight.  I was exactly 239 lbs when this blog started.  I should probably point out that one of my heroes  is also 239lbs.  There was a time when he stood on the scale and it eventually landed on 239, and Homer exclaimed, “239…ohhh… I’m a whale! ”  So if this weight is good enough for Homer Simpson, why isn’t good enough anymore for Fat Tom?  Well I’m preparing for my blog swimsuit calendar and trying to get that “six pack” look in my abs.  Yeah right!  Never mind a six-pack gut, if I could even get down to six chins I would be happy.  So if it isn’t for a vanity reasons, why in the heck would I want to lose these pounds that have stuck with me through thick and thicker?

Four of the reasons I’ll be thanking God today are my children.  I know that if I want to be around to walk the last one down the aisle (4 weddings…I’m already feeling faint), I better get out of the morbidly obese category now.  So, for the blogger that has tried everything to lose weight, what is going to be different this time?  Well this time, this big guy is going to turn it over to the even bigger guy in the sky.  Yep…just like most of us, I’m turning what should be the first thing we turn to as a last resort: Prayer.  Every morning I’m just going to pray that if I ever exceed 2000 calories in a day, that the good Lord will just shoot a lightning bolt down and strike me dead while roasting my sausage fingers from the inside.  So…I guess it was good knowing you. 

Before I head off to the great buffet in the sky, I’m just going to put out an unnecessary reminder.  We all have a LOT to be thankful for.  No matter how broke you think you are, you are wealthier than over 95% of the people in this world.  You can choose to worship  wherever or whenever you would like…or you can choose not to.    Even the freedom of expression that we take for granted.  Last week some people in China were arrested because yahoo turned over their information to the government as the Chinese law said it had to.  The government didn’t like some emails they sent, so they arrested them.  A fat blogger wouldn’t stand a chance there. This is just some of the stuff we take for granted in America.  Take a few minutes today and tell God thanks.    You don’t need to recite any fancy words, just talk to God like you would talk to your best friend.  If you need any inspiration, maybe a recent prayer my 4 year old said will help: “Dear God, thank you for all of our stuff.  Thank you for my friends and my dog.  Thank you for Mommy, Daddy, and my sisters E and D and M, that is the one that is always telling me what to do and thinks she is the boss of me…but she’s NOT!  Amen.”

HAPPY TURKEY DAY TURKEYS!!!!

Sally…(that girl!)

Okay….I’ve got to come clean.  I know that I’ve got to be honest and genuine before my God and my blog.  So…here goes…I’m just going to say it now…I, I… am more than just “big boned.”  No, wait a minute, that’s not it.  Ahhhh!  Why am I so weak? I feel like I’ve got the cartoon angel and devil on my shoulders.  “Honesty is always the best policy and your audience of 4 will understand” says the little Angel.   “Hey Fatty….if you tell them… they are going to feed you to the hippos, because your nothing but a crit” the little devil says.  What?  What in the heck is a “crit”?  Okay, once again the devil makes no sense, so I am really just going to spit it out this time: I’ve got a girlfriend.

“Ha,! I knew it! All of these so-called Christians are hypocrites” you might be saying to yourself.  The word hypocrite actually stems from the old Greek plays where an actor would have two masks to portray his feelings.  You could say he was “two faced.”  Is it any wonder that someone came up with the vastly superior creation of mimes?  I know I always wanted to be a mime,even as a kid.  I would take the cream out of my twinkies and oreo cookies and rub it all over my face.  I would then go around yelling proudly, “Look at me, I’m a mime.”  Then one of my brothers would point out that “Mimes don’t talk you idiot” which would usually send me running off to my Mommy crying, “I’m a good bo, right Mommy?”"

Anyway, my girlfriends name is Sally.  We met only a few months ago, but it was almost love at first sight.  She just seemed to radiate, she would always listen to me, and just felt right as I held her in my hand.  She was funny and would tell me jokes and on regular basis.  Sometimes, she would even make me cry.  “The market lost another 300 points” she would say.  Or “your Cal Bears just lost to Berkeley Junior High school” which would send me off running to my Mommy all over again.

My wife Stacey is jealous of Sally.  Apparently, she thinks I pay more attention to Sally than her.  Yes, I know what you are thinking, my wife knows about my little girlfriend.  Heck, even my kids know.  In fact, when my 4 year old daughter sees me paying more attention to my girlfriend that my wife she breaks out in song, “Sally…th, th, that, that, that,that, that girl.”  Which always makes me think, “Boy, how bad was some of that music we listened to in the 80’s?”  It also makes me realize that my little girl is probably the only 4 year old in the entire world that knows that stupid song.  Anyway, I’m not sure why Stacey is jealous of Sally, afterall she named her.  Before that, she was just my Treo cell phone.

My love affair with Sally ended a couple of weeks ago.  That is when my co-worker walked in with his new IPhone.  Wow!  Now that was a sleek figure.  She had all the bells and whistles and can do things that Sally won’t be able to do for years to come.  Like any hot-blooded male, I immediately felt myself violating what God says in the Bible, “Thou shalt not covet your neighbor’s electronic gadgets.”  I’m pretty sure that this was supposed to be the 11th commandment, but Moses was too busy chatting away on his cell phone to hear God.  Anyway, after being wowed by the latest thing, I went back to Old What’sHerName.

She no longer looked so radiant.  In fact, she now even had fingerprints and smudges on her.  Of course they were fingerprints and smudges left behind from my caresses, but who wanted and old smudged  loved one when there were newer ones on the market?  She no longer fit like the way she did in our early courtship days and she might even have put on some weight.  I was quickly losing interest in her and was just trying to figure out where on my body I should tattoo my new mantra of “Out with the old, in with the new.”

Well, besides just cell phones, doesn’t it seem like that is life these days?  Our jobs, our relationships, our faith.  Exactly when did commitment become a four letter word? The Bible tells us that God will finish the good work he has begun in us.  I don’t know about you, but he has his work cut out with me.  I’m a great starter of projects, but not such a good finisher.  It is something I am very cognizant of, pray about, and am working on.  In fact,….

Love Personified (and a shave)

To me, Mother Theresa is the personification of love.  She was a woman that committed her whole life to serving others.  She never once said, “why me?,” never uttered a single swear word, and deserves to be called the Saint some people like to think of her as.  I know she always wears the same outfit, but I don’t think sense of fashion is a requirement for sainthood.   Besides, I’m guessing you would be fashionably challenged too if you had 8 kids.  What?  Oh, you thought I was referring to Mother Theresa of Calcutta?  No, I was referring to my Mother Theresa of Orange County.  And that outfit she is always sporting about town isn’t a nun’s habit, it is a bright pink sweatsuit that my brother and I have our little disagreements over (I say she looks like a giant Pepto Bismol bottle in it, but he says she looks like the Easter Bunny).

My Mom always had her priorities in order, God first, then her Family, then work, then her friends.  My Dad, although he was a great man, probably wasn’t the best Father or Husband who ever lived.  My dad used to volunteer on skid row, drive a truckload of food and clothes down to the less fortunate in Mexico at least once a month, and went to church daily.  My brothers and I can remember when we were visiting Washington D.C. as kids.  It was a freezing cold winter day, and my Dad literally took his favorite jacket off and put it on the shoulders of a homeless man.  Like I said, he really was a great man. 

My Dad was more than a little challenged in the Fatherhood and Husband areas though (yes…even more than your fat blogging buddy).   As you can imagine with 7 sons, there was always a game or a practice or some sort of sports activity going on.  I cannot remember my Dad even being at one single game of mine.  My Mom, amazingly, attended every one of our games.  Financially, my Dad didn’t do much better.  You know that sign some restaurants have that says, “Free Food tomorrow.”  That would be my Dad’s sign except it would say, “I should be getting a check in two weeks.”  It, like the free food, never came.  This however, could not be blamed on the lack of my Dad trying every get rich scheme invented.  If you had an opening in the downline of your multi-level marketing pyramid, my Dad was your sucker.  Somehow he never learned his lesson in this area just as he never learned that as much as God wants us to serve others, he wants to start in our own homes with our own families. 

My Mom however, she lived this lesson.  If Dad wasn’t bringing home a big paycheck (or a paycheck period for that matter) my Mom picked up the slack.  She would wake up, make breakfast, get everyone where they were supposed to be, and then babysit and feed neighborhood kids, prepare dinner and attempt to keep the house in order, get 2-3 hours of sleep, and then head to her second job at about 2 in the morning.   Her 2nd job was in Santa Ana (I’ll put it this way…you won’t find it on any safest city list) where she would go unload bundles of paper off a truck.  She did whatever it took because she had a selfless love for God and her Family. 

As my Mom gets up there in age, she’s getting a little…ummm…how do I put this…kooky, I guess.  She giggles and nods alot and frequently sees her kids or grandkids in strangers.  The medical term is dementia, and I guess some of her actions could be expected by how she lived her life.  For example, you cannot spend more than about 10 minutes with my Mom without her telling you about how much she loves her kids.  Unfortunately, she repeats the same 5 stories every time.  Let’s see there is the one how after the birth of her third child, the nurse came in and yelled at her to not have any more kids.  That one is kind of funny if you ask me.  I mean, just how ugly was my brother Paul that when he was born a nurse would come yell at the woman that gave birth to him.  I can safely laugh here because I was a very cute baby.  At least I think I was.  I was the 7th of 8 kids so although my eldest siblings had lots of pictures, there was only one picture that my Mom is “pretty sure” is me.  Surprisingly, I was actually very tan as a baby and had almost a full afro.

Then there are other actions that you wouldn’t necessarily expect from my Mom.  For example, I recently took her to the airport with me to pick up my oldest daughter.  Everything was going very smoothly at the airport until we got to the security area.  There was a big sign that instructed everyone to remove their shoes and put them on the Xray machine with their other personal belongings.  My Mom’s pink sweatsuit doesn’t have pockets so we didn’t have to worry about any personal belongings so I just let her know she was going to have to remove her psychedelic Van style slip-ons.  “No” she replied and then giggled.  “What!, come on Mom, everyone has to take off their shoes here” I told her.  More giggles along with some head nods. “Mom!” I demanded, “let me take off your shoes we are holding up the line.”  More giggles.  By then, the sight of the fat guy wrestling the old lady that wouldn’t stop giggling was causing a bit of a scene and security was all over it.  “Is there a problem here?” he asked.  I’m sure the airport security guys see a lot, but this one seemed a little perplexed when I explained the situation.  He got on his radio and called his supervisor…”Uh Sergeant…we’ve got a possible situation here.  We’ve got  a woman approximately 70 years old, dressed in all pink, and won’t remove her shoes OR stop giggling.” His supervisor’s response was, “Ohhh… that’s a woman, I thought it was the Easter Bunny.”  Score one for my brother. 

It’s not just mentally that my Mom changes as she ages, she’s got some bizarre physical changes going on as well.  For example, my mom now has a beard.  It isn’t a freakish bearded lady from the circus kind of beard, but kind of resembles the beard of that blind old Asian guy from all the old karate movies.  On an old Asian man, it looks pretty cool.  On a old Caucasian woman, not so much.  We didn’t know what to do with it at first.  We tried putting it in dread locks for a little bit, but that didn’t go so well.  It only resulted in my Mom getting hassled unnecessarily by the cops.  Apparently an old lady that looks like a rasta-farian walking around in a pink sweat suit giggling uncontrollably has “possible drug dealer” written all over them.   Next, we tried to just pluck her fu-manchu by hand.  I would have to always say the parents line, “Now this is going to hurt me more than it hurts you.”  She, of course, would giggle. 

Eventually I got smart, and just started shaving it.  Now, it isn’t what you are picturing.  We didn’t take her to the barber shop where they would put a bunch of lather on her face and then pull out the straight razor.  No…apparently my extra strength nose hair trimmer also doubles as beard remover for old ladies.  This is the Mother/Son type of bonding my Mom and I now share.  I shave her beard and then she trims my nose hairs.  Then of course, we both giggle. 

Real love expressed through unselfish service, is unfortunately probably even more rare than the bearded circus ladies.  If you encounter one person that truly possesses it, consider yourself lucky.  I must have accidently eaten a rabbit’s foot or something recently, because I just came across another person that expressed this kind of love.   His name is Lou Baum and we recently met each other’s acquaintance.  We’ve only talked over the phone and via email so I have no idea what he looks like.  I do have a picture in my mind of what I think Lou might look like though.  Although he is about 70 years old, I bet if he wanted to, that Lou could still crush someone like me who would be exactly half his age.  I would guess that when you shake Lou’s hand, you say a prayer for a quick release with no broken bones.  He’s probably either bald or at least thinning on top, and may or may not have a beard (probably not as good as my Mom’s though).

Anyway, since I don’t know or really care what Lou looks like, let me tell you just some of the things that makes him so impressive.  In 2003, the Ft. Worth Star telegram selected Lou as the “Man of the Year.”  A few years before that, the city of Euless, TX selected Lou as the “Volunteer of the Year.”  In 2001, he was flown to Washington as he was 1 of only 5 individuals in the nation that year to be presented with a certain Award that is given to individuals who significantly improve the lives of Children.  In 1988, President Ronald Reagan honored Lou by requesting that he serve on and assist the National Commission on Rare Diseases.  Go way back to Lou’s younger days, and he was a ballplayer.  Right after he graduated high school, Lou signed on with the Washington Senators where he became good friends with another young ballplayer that you may have even heard of… only the great Mickey Mantle.

Anyway, now you can see why although I’ve never met him in person, I think Lou is such a stud.  Why am I writing about Lou? He needs our help.  Lou is the President and Chairman of the Board of a charity called The World Life Foundation.   This is a charity that was created to make available, and support, research, medical and scientific projects for those interested in rare metabolic diseases.  Imagine if your son or daughter was sick, really sick and you took them to the doctor only to be told that they have no idea what is so horribly affecting your child.  They would probably then refer you to a specialist who after unsuccessfully diagnosing your kid’s illness, would refer you to a different specialist.  All the while, your child is getting sicker and sicker, while the doctors scratch their heads and wonder what it might be.  Unbeknownst to them, a child on the other side of the world might be exhibiting the same symptoms, and the doctor’s there might have some critical information that could save the life of your child.  If you are like me, the Lord blessed you with very healthy children and you now take their health for granted.  So imagining this scenario above, might be a little difficult for you.

Lou doesn’t have to imagine this.  Lou’s daughter Catherine has a rare liver disorder and at the young age of 21, Catherine is the oldest person in the world with this disorder.  There was a young man in England that had it that was a year older than Catherine, but he passed away last year.  So now, as the medical community watches Catherine’s progress,  Lou works two jobs even at the age of 70, and gets to deal with bureaucracy.  You see for her survival, Catherine needs medicine flown in from Germany and Japan every two weeks.  It, like all of her medical expenses, is very costly.  Fortunately, it is covered by medicare.  Well, I should say it was covered by medicare.  When her last shipment didn’t arrive, Lou called to inquire on its whereabouts only to be told then (not in advance) that medicare wasn’t picking it up anymore and that Catherine wouldn’t be receiving her medication that day.  Unfortunately, Lou is used to this type of thing as he has been dealing with red tape for years. 

The World Life Foundation provides all of its services for free.  So, I thought along with a measly financial contribution, I could also help by passing along this information (I do have an audience of 4 people now as my brother Pat- not to be confused with the ugly baby Paul, his wife, and their oldest daughter said they would continue to read my blog).  If you realize how fortunate you are because your little blessings don’t have some rare disorder and you can make a financial donation, please do so.  If you can help in some other way, do that.  If you cannot do either right now, I just ask that you keep the Baum Family, The World Life Foundation, and all of the people it helps in your prayers.   The World Life Foundation can be reached at  800-289-LIFE (5433) and donations can be sent to P.O. Box 571 in Bedford, TX 76095.  Thank you for prayerfully considering this and just to give you an extra incentive, for anyone that helps financially, I’ll let their kid shave the Easter Bunny this year.

Who is this Grace, and what makes her so Amazing anyway?

Tonight I get to watch one of my Brothers in Christ get baptized.   For the non-believers out there, Baptism in the Christian faith is when the Pastor holds your head underwater to drown the sin right out of you.  The more you have sinned, the longer he holds you under.  I remember my baptism, it was my first near death experience.  It took three paramedics performing CPR along with the Pastor whacking me in the head with a Bible while yelling, “Be healed in the Name of JEEEEEZus!” to finally save me.  It was all worth it though, because the baptism is where a Christian gets his super powers.  I was given the ability to clear out a room with a single…nevermind.

None of that is true.  Being baptized basically is saying publicly that you have asked Jesus into your heart and that you are going to live your life for him.  In these times when school girls are being suspended for hugs, what’s wrong with a little PDA for the Lord?  I remember my first attempt at this.  It was right after it started to dawn on me, that maybe the Bible wasn’t a bunch of hoooey.  What can I say, I was appropriately named. The given name on my birth certificate is Fat Thomas, just like the Doubting dude in the bible (he wasn’t called “Fat” though because I think he did the South Beach Diet).  Anyway, it started to hit me that if the Bible really was true, what did that mean for how I was living my life? 

So I sent all of my heathen buddies an email that basically said that I was mightier than thou were and invited them over to the Bonfire I was hosting that night where we were going to burn all of our nudie magazines, AC/DC records, and any books written by J.D. Salinger.  Okay, that’s not true either, but I basically sent my Friends and Family an email describing what was happening in my life, and that I was choosing to live for God from there on out.  Now…keep in mind… my buddies had known me to be anything but  a Godboy and my Family knew me as the one that enjoyed getting them to argue about the difference in their denominations (topic for another post).  One of my friend’s wife called my wife to ask if I had joined a cult…and she was serious.  My poor wife didn’t know how to answer because she wasn’t a believer yet and was still trying overcome the fact that if she did become a believer, she automatically would turn into Benny Hinn.

So if it isn’t the act of Baptism that saves us, what is it?  Grace.  Amazing, beautiful, grace.  If you don’t know the origins of the song, it was written by John Newton.  Mr. Newton was a slave trader.  On one of his trips his ship carrying literally a boatload of slaves, he hit some storms.  Not some puny, “Oh gosh the ship is is a -rocking” kind of storms but a real, “Oh God, if you can just get me out of this, I’ll turn my life around and live for you.   Honestly…please…please…please.  Okay, what if I write a really cool song?  Pretty please.”  John Newton seems he was a lot like me and you.  I know when I find myself in the storms of life is the times when I get down on my knees and plead with God.    Anyway, God answered Newton’s prayers, and Newton kept his promise.  Remember, he was a slave trader at the time.  We don’t have slave traders these days, so to help you relate, if Newton lived in our time, he probably would have done mortgages.  Through the GRACE of God, Newton went from sailing his slave boat right to hades, to writing one of the most beautiful songs of all times. 

If there was a pendulum of sinners, I’d probably fall somewhere between Newton and Paul.  I have done a LOT of very stupid and very sinful things (most of which are actually glamorized in today’s world), but I think Paul still may have had me beat.  If you don’t know who Paul is, he is the guy who wrote most of the second half of the Bible and he was a real bad dude.  He literally hunted down Christians before he was saved by…what else…the Grace of God.  So if God with his Amazing Grace can save a Christian hunter, a slave trader, and a Fat Blogger who still battles with sin on a daily basis, he can save you if you ask him to (maybe tell him you’ll write a cool song too).

It is by grace you have been saved, through faith- and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God- not by works, so that no one can boast.    Ephesians 2:8-9

PRESENTly challenged

I took the kids to their Cousin Alex’s first birthday party today.  We arrived about thirty minutes after the start time, and in true Stafford fashion, we were the first ones there.  Alex’s siblings ran out excited to see their cousins.  I got my kids out of my wife’s sweet ride (a lowered minivan- technically only lowered when I’m in it) and was almost all the way up to the house, when my six year old nephew asked, “Hey, where’s your present?”  My first thought was when did my little nephew become a bouncer but it then turned to gratefulness because I’m sure it would have stayed in the back of the sweet ride if he wouldn’t have reminded me.  I quickly got the birthday present  and was heading back up to the front door when my six year old nephew turned bouncer had to ask, “What did you get him?” I replied, “We brought him some toy that will make lots of noise and annoy your parents to no end.”    I’ve got to be honest, I actually had no idea what we got him, as my wife picks out the presents in our family.  I seem to be more than just a little challenged in this area.  My wife would definitely tell you  that is the understatement of the century.

God definitely knew what he was doing when he picked Stacey for me.  Any other woman would have left me years ago while screaming, “It’s the thought that counts,  My butt!”  Let me recap a few of the more recent actual gifts I’ve given my wife.  Two years ago for Christmas, I gave her a cookbook.  I thought she would enjoy learning how to cook some new meals.  Come to think of it, I think I even threw in a new pan.  I thought it was a pretty good gift and even my wife seemed to like them, until she talked to my sister who said, “He gave you WHAT?”   This past Christmas, I stuck with the book idea but this time I made it a weight loss book.  As a bonus, I even threw in a new bathroom scale.  If you don’t know my wife, she doesn’t need to lose weight.  SHE mentioned that she wanted to drop a few, so I thought I would support her.  What better time than Christmas?  I mean WWJD right?  There is a verse in the  Bible that says that if you even give a cup of water to those in need, it is if you did it for Jesus himself.  I’m sure Jesus probably would have given Stacey the same thing I did for his birthday.  The only difference is that if Jesus gave it to her, my pesky sister wouldn’t have exclaimed, “WHAT? Your kidding right!  Just when you thought he couldn’t do any worse than last year!”  Well I finally learned my lesson last month for Stacey’s birthday.  No books or other tangible items.  That’s right, I probably outdid even myself.  For her 35th birthday, my lucky wife got “The Gift of Intimacy” from her husband.  You see one of the blinds in our bedroom are broken so I offered to get them fixed for her.  That was over a month ago, and the blinds are still broken.  However, I did give her the other gift of intimacy that night (IF you know what I mean…wink, wink). By the way, I didn’t have to wait to hear it from my sister on that one, my wife did a perfectly good job of letting me know what she thought of my gift.

So, I guess I’m asking for help.  Christmas is only a little over a month away and the only thing I can think of is a new ironing board cover.    She keeps hinting at a new wedding band, but that’s not going to happen.  Hers was stolen at one of our Open Houses probably 4 years ago.  Just so you won’t think I’m some mean husband that doesn’t care that his wife’s wedding band was stolen, I’ll let you know the two reasons why: 1. I’m broke (I’m in the mortgage industry-enough said). 2. I think the wedding industry is the second biggest scam going.  Before you ask, the funeral industry is THE biggest scam.  Prove how much you love me by how much you spend on the box that you are going to stick me in and then throw dirt on.  It makes absolutely no sense and I’m going to go on the record right now that when I ultimately lose this battle to obesity, I want the cheapest box they make.  Anyway, the wedding industry is just like the funeral industry.  Prove how much you love me by how much you spend on a rock.  No way, they aren’t going to play me for a fool. 

So, if you have any suggestions for presents that don’t support any scam industries (and preferably are less than $20), PLEASE let me know.

Knock knock

I used to be funny.  Honestly, people used to say, “Tom, not only are you the smartest, most handsome man I know, you are also pretty funny.”  To which I would always give the same response, “Thanks Mom.”  Well, I think I might have lost it.  So I set off to find my sense of humor.

The first place I went was my kids.  They told me a very funny joke about how to make a tissue dance, but I just wasn’t feeling it.  I then watched, “How Stella got her groove back?”  Still nothing.  Maybe since I’m new at this blogging thing, I could find my inspiration from other Blogs.  I’ve got two friends that have blogs, come to think of it, I think I’ve only got two friends period.  Anyway, I checked their blogs, they weren’t necessarily funny, but they absolutely blew mine away.    One of them was our friend Casey’s, she had music, pictures, links and all of this cool stuff on her Blog (http://www.bettatogetha.blogspot.com/ ).  Beanie is my world traveler buddy.  His blog (http://www.4tttts.blogspot.com/)wasn’t as techie as Casey’s, but it did have pictures of him eating gerbils on it.  Basically if the three of us were on Blog Survivor Island, they wouldn’t even have to vote.  The host would just announce, “Tom your Blog isn’t funny and you stink, as a special torture for you, please extinguish your torch on your crotch.”  Hmmm…still nothing.

Why did I ever think I was funny in the first place?  Oh yeah…this is Vicki’s fault.  When we were still in Texas, there was a group of us from church in a weight loss contest when we lived in Texas.  I didn’t win the contest, but sent a couple of wacky emails while putting on 7 lbs.  One of the other contestants was a very sweet woman by the name of Vicki.  Vicki worked at the church and enjoyed my obvious witt displayed in my emails.  She even went as far as to tell me after the contest ended that she missed my writing.  Well, who do you think I would turn to after a couple of blog entries but before going public?  That’s right….Vicki!  I mean, she had to be nice, she worked at the church! Well she was nice with her feedback, in a, “I’m being nice because I have to” kind of way. 

I guess I cannot blame Vicki.  What was I thinking putting an entry of the death of my Father as one of the first entries?  Apparently playing Hearts on the bed of a dieing man, just isn’t funny.  Me almost pulling the plug on his life support because he kept inadvertently (and unconsciously) letting them know when I was shooting the moon.  Nothing.  I should have waited until May 13th when I could have said it was 8.5 years since my Father passed away.  At least in May I might know what the heck I’m doing with this whole Blog thing and have established myself as an actual Blogger (possibly even a funny blogger by then).  But NOOOOO….I had to make it like my third post ever.  Yeahhh me!

It wasn’t always like this.  You don’t know this, but there was even a time when what I wrote what I thought was a really wacky book.    Well…I guess I should clarify and say I wrote about 40 pages of a really wacky book before I sent it to some hotshot publisher.  She basically replied that she wouldn’t line Beanie’s gerbil cage with my book.  I had to write her back and one-up her by letting her know it was too late anyway, because Beanie already ate his gerbil.  Anyway, it was probably the funniest book you’ll never read.  My brother Pat wishes he could say that he never read it.  I had him read my “manuscript” while I stood above him in anticipation for him to break out in hysterics at any moment.   I kept giggling a schoolgirl and saying things like, “You’re going to love this next part, it is sooo funny!”  The hysterics never came, but I chalked it up as he never really was a reader and really didn’t know comedy writing (I’m pretty sure he thinks Dave Barry played linebacker for the 1972 Steelers). 

Boy, I’m starting to laugh just thinking about how funny that book was (or technically wasn’t since that darn lady killed my dreams).  It was called “How Fat Tom Conquered the Big Four.”  It was going to be a book where I gave advice on such things as Health and Diet, relationships, finances, and discovering God.  Of course that was probably 4-5 years ago and I’m fatter and broker than when I wrote that riot.  You know what, since you are my faithful reading audience of zero, I’m going to give you a real treat.  I’m going to share an excerpt from “Fat Tom” just so you can judge for yourself: 

          It is actually quite easy to get down to a healthy weight, and maintain that weight for life.  Just follow this simple plan:

If you don’t already have it, you might want to obtain medical insurance for this (life insurance might also not be a bad idea).  Go into the emergency room with “Really bad pains in your stomach.”  Moan and groan about how bad it hurts while the nurse takes your temperature and blood pressure.  When the doctor finally gets to you, he will ask you a couple of questions (basically he wants to know if you can pay for his services), and then begin to poke you in a couple of choice places.  As soon as he begins to poke you in the stomach, scream bloody murder, and attempt to strike him.  Congratulations, you have now been diagnosed with appendicitis and you’ll be on the operating table before the day is over.

Are you still with me? Now that the surgery is complete we’re only half way through my master plan, and this is where it gets a little tricky.  The doctor will be a little grumpy with you when you finally come to.  He is going to want to know why you didn’t tell him your appendix had already been removed.  Get angry back at him and yell out, “What, should I have told you I was in a burrito eating contest this afternoon too?” Then watch him storm out of the room in a huff while muttering, “I can’t believe I missed my tee time for this idiot.” Make sure he is completely out of the room, and then act quickly.  Swallow a scalpel (you might want to throw in some nuts and bolts too for good measure, but don’t overdo it).  If you are wondering, I’m pretty sure it is red wine that goes with metal.

Approximately fifteen minutes after your operation, they are going to be moving the next patient in your room (this is their subtle hint to get out).  As you are walking out of the hospital, pick a time when at least two or more medical personnel are watching (you should be moaning and groaning again to help with this), and then grab your stomach and collapse.  Very loudly start saying that your stomach doesn’t feel right and you think that the doctor did something to you because you passed gas on his operating table.  By this time you are going to have a couple of very large orderlies assisting you out.  Before they toss you into the street, demand a x-ray just to make sure everything is okay.

The doctor is going to want to examine your x-rays behind closed doors.  Give him exactly three minutes and barge in on him yelling, “I knew it.  You left your scalpel in me, didn’t you?”  This would also probably be a good time to do a quick scan to make sure he was actually looking at your x-ray when you barged in on him.  Either way, he is now all yours.

Get on your cell phone right away and call Domino’s Pizza (pretend it is your lawyer).  Start telling the kid on the other line how your doctor just completely botched your operation and make sure you throw out terms like “the lawsuit of the century.”  Try not to smile while you watch your doctor grovel in front of you.  After he is done crying, suggest that you would be willing to listen if he came up with the right proposal, but it would take something like, “Free liposuction for life” for you not to sue the pants off of him.  With that, you just sealed the deal.  Very soon you will be able to get down to a healthy weight, and maintain it for life. Not a bad plan, eh?

 

See what I mean…pretty funny stuff, eh?  Okay, I think that is all I needed to get my comedic juices flowing.  I’m sure I’ll be witty from here on out.  But, I guess just to be safe, you make a tissue dance by putting a little boogie in it!  Get it?

 

Pop

November 13th, 2007 marked the 8th anniversary of my Dad’s passing.   The time has gone fast and I can still remember the days around his death like they happened maybe  one or two years ago at the most.  We were fortunate in the sense that we got some advance notice.  In fact, I still remember getting called at my place of employment in Northern California and being told that he wasn’t going to live much longer.  He had a stroke prior to that and that combined with what the doctor’s were chalking up to end stage  Parkinson’s Disease, had put him in a coma.  The entire family congregated on that hospital room in Southern California.  Yep…the three days prior to my Dad passing away, were actually three very good days.

They started out pretty much as you would expect.  A lot of tears, prayers (even this agnostic at the time blogger was praying), and a lot of trying to figure out what was actually going on with our Dad…and unfortunately too much thought and arguing about the best way to handle things from that point.  You see my Dad was on a life support machine that was doing the breathing for him.  According to the Doctors he was never going to come out of the Coma as his body was systematically shutting down.  Thank God I had married a nurse who could make some sense for all of us from the Doctor’s not so friendly bedside manner and his explaining what was happening to our Dad in 100% medical mumbo jumbo that none of us could understand.  In case you are wondering, none of this is what made these days so special to me.

When you are anticipating death and it doesn’t happen, you’ve got to pass the time somehow.  Well, we broke out some cards.  We started out with a game of Hearts, but before you knew it, we found ourselves in a full-blown Hearts tournament.  I think we were actually using what used to be the sizable belly of my Dad as one of the playing tables.  While we played cards over my comatose Father, we shared stories, jokes, a lot of remember when Dad…., and we laughed and laughed.  We would get so caught up in just good old fashion love that we would almost forget that Pop was lying there dieing.  And then…he would let out some grunt or groan and we would remember that we were supposed to be somber and at least quiet down our laughter for a couple of minutes.  Pop’s grunts and groans always seemed to coincide with when I happened to be trying to Shoot the Moon (a sly and very risky move in Hearts that can basically make or break you depending on how successful you are or are not at shooting the moon).  I was convinced that one of my brothers or probably more likely my wife (remember she was still my nemesis then), had paid off my Dad to signal when I was Shooting the Moon.  Between hands we would sing, share more stories, shed tears of sadness, and then one of us would say something that made us laugh so hard that tears of joy would be rolling down our cheeks.  It was an awesome three days…and then my earthly Father went home to meet his Heavenly Father. 

I actually had the privilege of holding my Dad’s hand the moment he passed away.  I had held his hand quite a bit those past three days and tried to make sure someone was holding it at almost all times.  I became very familiar with my Dad’s hands at that time so when I went to touch his hand at the viewing at the funeral parlor the next night, the contrast was noticeably different.  In fact, it wasn’t just his hands, it was his whole body.  What was my Pop just a couple of days prior, now seemed to be replaced with a wax figure.  My Dad was gone.  Physically his body was still right there in that coffin, but my Dad, the soul of my earthly father, was gone. 

The Bible tells us that when we get to Heaven, we’ll be given new bodies.  These bodies won’t be susceptible to thing like strokes or Parkinson’s Disease.  They won’t deteriorate or grow decrepit (or even grow love handles for that matter) as we spend eternity with God in Heaven.  Sound good? If it does you need to get right with the only one that can give you everlasting life.  If you don’t know who that is consider what Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.”  Just living a “good life” isn’t going to get you there.  If you are at all like me before I was a believer, you have a million reasons to not believe.  Do yourself an eternal favor and check it out for yourself.  Start with Jesus.  The Bible promises us that anyone who sincerely and ernestly seeks God, will be rewarded (Hebrews 11:6)If you don’t have thousands of hours to investigate who Jesus really was and is, don’t worry, others have already done the research for you.   One book that I would recommend because it was very instrumental in me becoming a believer is a book called, The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel.  The reason I like this book was that it used sources outside of the Bible to investigate Jesus.  Lee was an atheist that was the editor of the Legal section of The Chicago Tribune.  He graduated from Harvard Law prior to that, and basically was no dummy.  When his wife became a Christian, he set out to prove Christianity false and show her what a big mistake she was making.  In the process of investigating Christianity, he came to the conclusion that it took a whole heck of a lot more faith to NOT believe that Jesus is God, than it did to believe it once he examined the evidence. 

Anyway, don’t take my word or even Lee’s word, check it out for yourself.  Before you know it, you and I are going to be that wax figure in the coffin.  When my time comes, I already know where my soul will be heading…do you?  Remember, as the old bumper sticker says, “If you are going the wrong direction with your life, God allows u-turns.”  If you are going to look like a wax figure at the end, your going to want to avoid extreme heat. 

 I love you Pop.