RickScheibner.net

Thanks to Rich for tagging me on this one.  Here goes:

The rules of this particular meme are: 1. List your top ten favorite films (in no particular order). 2. If you are tagged, you have to post and tag 3-5 people. 3. Link back to the one who tagged you. 4. Tip the hat to Dan.

In no particular order, here are my top ten movies of all time:

1. The Shawshank Redemption–Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins at their best.
2. Dances With Wolves–The stunning scenery was second only to the spot-on cultural portrayals in this one. 
3. The Matrix–The technology is starting to look a little dated, and this thing still gets parodied quite a bit, but man this is a mind-boggling flick.
4. Akeelah and the Bee–This should be on every educator’s top ten list. 
5. Lord of the Rings Trilogy–You really can’t mention one here without mentioning all three.  I’ve wondered sometimes what it would be like to sit and watch all nine hours of this thing in one setting. 
6. The Apostle–Not too proud to admit it:  I probably wouldn’t have put this movie on here unless I’d seen it first on Rich’s list.  Robert Duvall nails the part of the beleaguered, pushed-over-the-edge southern preacher man.  Both justice and redemption in the end.
7. The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe/Prince Caspian–I read this book series probably 20 times or more when I was growing up.  And a few more times as an adult, too.  Can’t wait for Dawn Treader in 2010.  I believe that comparisons to the LOTR trilogy are unfair, despite the kinship of their respective authors. 
8. This Is Spinal Tap–There’s an obnoxious, immature 16 year old boy in me that has to see this movie once ever couple of years or so.  Completely irreverent and totally off the wall.  Just make sure yours is turned all the way to 11.
9. A Christmas Carol (George C. Scott version)–Gotta see this one at least a couple of times every Christmas.  And maybe once in the in-between season, too.
10. Dead Man Walking–Redemption seems to be a theme on this list.  Sean Penn and Susan Sarandon in this one.

Ok, now who to tag?  How about John, Bryan, Stephen, Joshua, and Marissa.

How does your list compare?

Tagged from John:

• A - ADVOCATE FOR: Kids from low-income families who have similar talents and abilities as their more affluent peers.
• B - BEST FEATURE: Ummm…hands? My wife would know better than I do.
• C - COULD DO WITHOUT: The status quo.
• D - DREAMS & DESIRES: Normalcy, whatever that looks like.
• E - ESSENTIAL ITEMS: Laptop, an open wi-fi signal, iPod, Oakleys.
• F - FAVORITE PASTIME: Blogging, worship team, spending time with my family.
• G - GOOD AT: Career, music.
• H - HAVE NEVER TRIED: Any kind of illegal drug. Not that I don’t have my vices; none of them just don’t involve narcotics.
• I - IF I HAD A MILLION DOLLARS: College for all of the kids
• J - JUNKIE FOR: Caffeine, whatever form it may come in.
• K - KINDRED SPIRIT: I won’t insult anybody who may have similar abilities/interests as me.
• L - LITTLE KNOWN FACT: I lettered in four different sports in high school.
• M - MEMORABLE MOMENT: Being on Coffee Hour show on KUMA
• N - NEVER AGAIN WILL I: Run/jog for fitness.
• O - OCCASIONAL INDULGENCE: Big oatmeal-raisin cookies.
• Q - QUOTE: “In times of change learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.“–Eric Hoffer
  
• R - REASON TO SMILE: My wife of 3 months, 4 days, and 4 hours.
• S - SORRY ABOUT: Tons.
• T - TAG SOME FRIENDS: Ben, Crystal, Doug, Joshua, Matt, Kat, Nicki
• U - UNINTERESTED IN: Hip-hop or country music of any kind.
• V - VERY SCARED OF: Being alone.
• W - WORST HABIT: My picky eating.
• X - X MARKS MY IDEAL VACATION SPOT: Oregon Coast, every time.
• Y - YUMMIEST DESSERT: Peanut butter/Chocolate pie
• Z - ZODIAC SIGN: Umm…Taurus? I know it more as a car than a sign, though.

John has a great meme going on where we display what’s on our desktop.  My year-old Dell Inspiron laptop is my main machine these days, so I’ll show what’s going on there.  Here’s my desktop in all of it’s 1280×800 pixel glory:

The picture is me and my two boys, taken at Hat Rock State Park last July.  I did some tomfoolery with the GIMP to get the effect of the natural tones mixed in with the sepia background.  I keep a pretty clean desktop, so I don’t have a lot of icons on display.  From top to bottom, I’ve got Computer, Documents, Pictures, Videos, Trash, and a shortcut to my USB drive.  The real action takes place in the lower left hand corner of the screen, where I keep shortcuts to most of my apps on the taskbar:

After the Start menu button, from left to right:

• Show desktop
• That cool cascading thing that Vista does with open apps
• Google Docs uploader
• Dreamweaver 8
• Paint Shop Pro X (seldom used, not available any more)
• Picasa desktop
• The aforementioned GIMP (my main image editor these days)
• Google Earth
• Google Desktop (seldom used any more)
• iTunes (What did we ever do without it?)
• Latest and greatest release of Firefox
• Flock (I’m still using it; just not right now)
• MSN Messenger (still have a few peeps on there)
• Windows Live Writer blog editor (The Ferrari of desktop blog editors)
• Thunderbird (Mozilla’s answer to Outlook Express–I combine it with GMail to meet all of my e-mail needs)
• Evernote (Got my beta invite, now I just need to spend some time with it to figure it all out)

I’m tagging everybody for this.

Tag, you’re it. 

I haven’t done a meme for a while, and this blog seems to be overtaken with del.icio.us links when I go for a few days without posting. Marissa Miller tagged me for a meme, so I thought I’d take her up on her offer. Come to think of it, I might have even done one similar to this somewhere along the way, but who knows. Here goes:

The rules are:
1. The rules of the game get posted at the beginning.
2. Each player answers the questions about themselves.
3. At the end of the post, the player then tags 5-6 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know they’ve been tagged and asking them to read your blog.
4. Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answer.

1) What was I doing 10 yrs ago?

Wow, 10 years ago seems like a couple of lifetimes ago. I was still in my first marriage getting ready to go back into the field of education. I was probably also taking care of my two boys, who would have been 6 and 2 at the time.

2) What are 5 things on my to-do list for today (not in any particular order):

Ummm…let’s see…Mow the lawn, do some homework, get my worship team folder organized, do some homework for school, and hopefully write a post on my disappointment with CCM.

3) Snacks I enjoy:

Nature Valley yogurt bars and any kind of fruit snacks.

4) Things I would do if I were a billionaire:

I would retire and then buy a nice big house in central Oregon. Then I would buy a helicopter and hire a pilot to take me there back and forth any time so I can spend more time with my two boys.

5) Three of my bad habits:

Wow, I’m not sure about this one. At my age, bad habits are so ingrained in me that I’m not even really aware of them. Also, I’m just socially awkward enough that I probably wouldn’t even care if I was aware of them.

6) 5 places I have lived:

Well, Salem Oregon when I was a kid, and lotsa small towns on the other side of the state since then.

7) 5 jobs I have had:

1. Fish guy at Skipper’s
2. Summer time school grounds maintenance
3. Wheat grower
4. Music teacher
5. School counselor

8 ) 5 peeps I wanna know more about:

1. Steven Russell
2. Stephen Rahn (he needs some ideas for blog posts anyway)
3. Doug Ruhs
4. Bryan Cooper
5. John Thomas

Originally tagged at:
depression introspection: Survey

Tags: memeblogging personal

There’s a meme going on over at Flickr called the “Song Chart Meme” that will probably appeal to your cultural as well as your analytical sides. The concept is this: Take the lyrics of a song, and represent them in graphic form. Some of the submissions are really good; I especially liked the “Don’t Cry For Me, Argentina”. Other songs were a little more obscure (or maybe I’m just too old, who knows).

Here’s my contribution, and I’m a little surprised it wasn’t done already. “Take it Easy,” the classic tune from the Eagles. Of course, I’ve represented these lyrics:

I’ve got seven women on
My mind,

Four that wanna own me,

Two that wanna stone me,

One says she’s a friend of mine

How’d I do?

Technorati Tags: Flickr, meme, Eagles, music, classic rock, lyrics

This is a little on the silly side, but I thought I’d do it anyway. It’s a meme. Basically, use Wikipedia and Flickr to generate the name of a band, it’s current album, and it’s ten tracks. Here’s mine, then look for the instructions afterward. I’m blaming John for this one.

Band name: Alcombe

Album name: When Givers Prove Unkind

Tracks:

1. Lamar Heights, Missouri (A town slightly bigger than my backyard, but with fewer Starbucks)
2. Vanja Gesheva-Tsvetkova (Ode to an obscure Olympian)
3. Vissarion
4. Little Miss Helpful (One for the kiddos)
5. Gasbags (Don’t ask…)
6. Turfan Prefecture (Written on the World Tour)
7. Milas-Bodrum Airport (Ditto)
8. Glidden Tour (Had to appease the sponsor)
9. Jai Turima (Continuing our theme of obscure Olympians)
10. Gulf of Mexico (Popular live song, recorded with special guest Jimmy Buffet)

Album Photo:

You, too, can get in on the act:

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
   The first article title on the page is the name of your band. Hit ‘random’ in the left nav-bar 10x for your tracks.
2. http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
   The last four words of the very last quote is the title of your album.
3. http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/
   The third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.

Thanks for humoring me on this one.