"Pun'kamelon" / Week 8

An actual interaction I had with a boney old man with stringy white hair, flowing from underneath a red Marines cap, at the Wal-Mart in Marion, Indiana:

He walks up to Tink and I as we are in line at one of the self-checkout lines, sees that we have two large pumpkins in our cart, and smiles.

"Whoa, those are pretty big pun'kins," he says, getting dangerously close to my personal space boundaries. I smile and nod.

"Those right there are Christmas pun'kins."

Again I laugh and nod my head and add a, "Yup," politely.

"You know, I always wondered what it would be like to cut open a pun'kin and it be a watermelon inside."

I chuckle and make eye-contact with Tink. She smiles at me and we both widen our eyes to each other.

"It'd be called a pun'kamelon," he declares, emphatically and proudly.

"I guess so," I responded, not really knowing what else to say.

He laughs to himself and shuffles off.

Week 8 NFL Picks
Last Week: 10-4
Overall: 52-35

INDY over Carolina
CINCINNATI over Pittsburgh
CHICAGO over Detroit
Oakland over TENNESSEE
Cleveland over St. Louis
MINNESOTA over Philly
NY Giants over MIAMI
NY JETS over Buffalo
SAN DEIGO over Houston
TAMPA BAY over Jacksonville
NEW ENGLAND over Washington
New Orleans over San Francisco
Game of the Week
DENVER over Green Bay

Joel Osteen / Week 7

Last Sunday 60 Minutes did a feature on pastor and ubiquitous media presence, Joel Osteen. It was the same run-of-the-mill take on the man that seems to cause so much dissension within the church. 60 Minutes showed him as a likable, charming speaker with a positive, uplifting message of hope and optimism amidst a world where such an attitude is less than prevalent. Then they showed a Christian scholar who claimed Osteen's message is "cotton candy religion" and that it really didn't help people as much as they might think it does.

As I watched his interview, it was hard for me to see him in the negative light that the scholar does and I once did. He does bring in thousands of lost, seeking people into his church every week, and millions of others through his television broadcasts and books. He seemed genuine and humbled by the fact that God is using him to help people, especially when he broke down reflecting on that very thought. And the answers to the interviewer's harder-hitting questions seemed to make sense. When asked why he doesn't use scripture as much as other pastors, and why he doesn't focus on sin, which are two big reasons why a lot of other Christians and scholars tend to find fault with him, he calmly answered that he didn't feel like that was his gift. He feels that his gift is giving positive words to those who need encouragement and ways to improve their life by improving relationships with other people, excepting the "place where they are," and having an optimistic way of looking at situations, not beating them down with what they do wrong, like much of the rest of the world does every day. He called them "simple" themes and concepts meant to improve life.

It makes sense to me, I thought. He is doing good things. He is helping people.

Then on Monday something happened I wasn't expecting. I was listening to ESPN Radio while at work when host Colin Cowherd brought up the very same 60 Minutes story. He was on the topic of the world being very cynical and referred to Joel Osteen's feature from the night before. He described Osteen as a guy who is trying to be positive in a world where children are watching death and smut on television everyday from a young age. Then he brought up the religious scholar who made the "cotton candy" statement. Cowherd then explained that he was not a religious person, that he did not go to church, but that Osteen was the only preacher he would watch on TV. He said that all other TV preachers seemed "fake" and greedy, but Osteen seemed like a real person who actually cared. And then he exclaimed that he didn't know why why so many scholars and pastors had anything bad to say about Osteen. He stated "So what," if Osteen doesn't use scripture. "Whatever gets them in the tent," he said. And then he explained that at the end of every message Osteen says for all his viewers and listeners to attend a Bible-believing church, which Cowherd interpreted as, "He doesn't say Christian, he doesn't say Jewish, he just says Bible."

After hearing Cowherd's view of Osteen, it forced me to revisit three big questions I thought I had had answered the night before:

1) What is his overall message and what is his audience hearing?

According to Cowherd it's that the Bible isn't that important. Not important enough to use it as the foundation for life. Osteen states that his new book, Become A Better You, uses scripture to "back up" his advice, not as a basis for it.

2) Are they also hearing that we can do it on our own?

Isn't the whole point of turning your life over to God that we realize that we cannot do anything on our own? Every attempt of becoming a better person, a righteous person who loves everyone as we love ourselves, using our own resources is in vain. We need Him, in the worst way imaginable.

3) Where does Jesus come into play?

As far as I know, from what I heard in the interview, He doesn't. Osteen never mentioned Jesus, his church doesn't have any crosses or banners proclaiming "Jesus Is Lord" or anything like that. I'm not saying that iconic representations of Jesus are absolutely necessary, but if his viewers never see the name Jesus or anything associated with His act of atonement, or better yet, hear the name Jesus, where are they going to get it? And how do you miss Jesus if you claim to be a preacher of the Good News?

Although Joel Osteen may be helping people have a more positive outlook on life and giving advice for improving relationships with others, I really don't see how that differs from your basic self-help guru, except for the fact that he sprinkles in "God" every once and awhile.

I think he tries to do good, I think he is genuine, and maybe his sermons and books improve peoples' lives to some degree, but only to the limit that we can go on our own, which is not very far at all.

He reminds me of Oprah. Both are media megastars with a big following who preaches an empty spirituality about doing good deeds and positive attitudes. This is all well and good, but I believe God would say, not good enough. Sure, he gets them in the tent, but the biggest question is what are they really leaving with?

Week 7 NFL Picks:

Last Week: 7-6

Overall: 42-31

Baltimore over BUFFALO

NY GIANTS over Niners

New England over MIAMI

Tennessee over HOUSTON

Tampa Bay over DETROIT

NEW ORLEANS over Atlanta

WASHINGTON over Arizona

OAKLAND over Kansas City

CINCINNATI over NY Jets

DALLAS over Minnesota

Chicago over PHILLY

SEATTLE over St. Louis

Pittsburgh over DENVER

Game of the Week:

INDY over Jacksonville

I'm the Jim of My Office / Week 6

I work in a climate-controlled, cube-dotted, and fluorescent-lit office building plopped down in the middle of a forest preserve in a quiet northern suburb of the third biggest city in the country. The building is separated into floors, and each floor a section. Each section is classified further into groups, which house aisles of 30 or so cubes, which hold one person each. Each group is assigned a name and genre of products. I am part of the LPG team, the Legal Professional Group. We reside on the first floor, Southwest section, of the Riverwoods Branch, of CCH, Inc., a Wolters Kluwer company. My group publishes new and revised laws, regulations, and court cases on topics ranging from banking and finance to advertising and nuclear energy.

Each group, I assume, resembles The Office in some way or another. And one can conclude that each group has a Jim. I’m the Jim of my office.

We have an Oscar. An effeminate Latino man who wears vibrant sweaters and sports a single stud earring. We have a Michael Scott, sort of. An extremely awkward higher-up who gets his kicks telling bad jokes. We have several Phyllises. Overweight, middle-aged women overscented with department store perfume and wearing flowery matching outfits from Fashion Bug, and who fill their area with pictures of their children and grandchildren and faraway beach scenes. We’ve got a Toby. A quiet, single guy who has an obvious crush on a co-worker. But ours wears see-through, short-sleeved collared shirts from the 70s. And we have a Kevin. A large balding man who creeps all the women out with his monotone voice and stalkerish tendencies. We do have a woman who is of Indian decent. But she is no Kelly.

We have a blond who obsesses over office parties and events, like organizing a coupon bin for the group’s cost-cutting needs, but she is not standoffish or cat-obsessed, like Angela. We have no Pam-like cute secretaries who dress modestly and excel in various crafts. No grumpy Black guy like Stanley, or overeager brown-noser like Andy. We lack Merediths—alcoholic redheads. We have a temp, but it’s an older woman who keeps to herself, not a young guy like Ryan.

And we only sort-of have a Dwight. He is a balding, bespectacled fellow who creeps around the attractive girls’ cubes sporting his size-too-small Banana Republic khakis. And he really doesn’t seem to have a job other than that. But he does not have a bobble head of himself. And he is not quite as militant, as far as I can tell.

But I am Jim. I find myself looking around the aisle for a camera some days. Like when two older women discuss their current bowel movements and whether or not cheese consumption has contributed to its erratic behavior. Or when our Michael makes comments like, “Well if my cube had a door, I’d have an open door policy.”

I search under my desk for boom mikes when the woman who sits across from me vocalizes her every thought. She says, “Shoot,” every time she makes a mistake (which is a lot), “Oh gee, its almost lunchtime,” every day at precisely 11:15 CST, and even “Stretch!” each time she does that. And her diction pierces through the ESPN Radio I blast in my headphones throughout the day, allowing me to hear even the most subtle utterance.

I scour my car for lipstick cams when I roll into the parking lot just in time to watch a co-worker’s morning routine of peering into every window of his new CRX to make sure that all the doors locked. Then spying him walk away, only to turn back around and check every window again. And then doing this again. And once more.

I look behind me to make sure I’m not being followed by a crew. Sometimes I’m hesitant of speaking for fear of delivering the wrong lines. But my day is never completely dull. And I guess, for a recent grad tackling bills and real apartment rent, and awaiting the inevitable death of an 11-year-old car, that’s all I can really ask for. Besides a raise.

NFL PICKS WEEK 6
Last Week: 11-3
Overall: 35-25

BALTIMORE over St. Louis
GREEN BAY over Washington
Tennessee over TAMPA BAY
Cincinnati over KANSAS CITY
Philadelphia over NY JETS
Houston over JACKSONVILLE
CHICAGO over Minnesota
CLEVELAND over Miami
ARIZONA over Carolina
SAN DIEGO over Oakland
SEATTLE over New Orleans
NY Giants over ATLANTA
Game of the Week:
New England over DALLAS

Ohio State, 2007 BCS Champs? / Week 5 picks

After the craziest two weeks in recent college football history, look at the AP Top 25 poll. Number one is LSU. No change there. They definitely deserve to be number one over that amazing comeback win over the defending National Champion Florida Gators. Number two is an undefeated Cal team. Ok, it’s a stretch, but I can see that. They beat a talented Oregon team and were regarded as a top ten team in the preseason. Number three is…Ohio State! Wait. Ohio State? The same Buckeye team that lost a Heisman trophy winner, two first round draft choices at wide receiver and a 1,000-yard running back after getting smashed in the BCS Championship Game? The same team that was supposed to be “rebuilding” after going undefeated last year?

It’s hard for me to believe that Ohio State is once again in the hunt for a national title, especially after an offseason where we lost so much talent and took a lot of shots from the national media. This year’s team, and the situation we find ourselves in, reminds me a lot of 2002, when OSU upset Miami to win a national championship. And they might be better built for winning it all this year than last year’s team.

Take a closer look: this defense is for real. They’re a year older than last year. They aren’t relying on turnovers as much as last year’s defense. Laurinaitis is playing out-of-his mind. Jenkins is looking like an All-American. The D-line, lead by Vernon Gholston is allowing negative yards rushing in most games. Offensively, we have a solid QB (Boeckman) who doesn’t make many bad mistakes (ignore those interceptions against Purdue). A great one-two punch with the Wells boys at RB. A knockout punch at wideout (Robiskie). And a few speedy athletes for catching passes, screens, and working it on special teams (Hartline, Small).

Here are the four biggest reasons why our chances look good:
Three of the four favorites to win it all this year have all been beaten in the last two weeks (USC, Florida, Oklahoma)
Cal plays USC later this year and will probably not be favored in that game.
LSU has to play in the SEC Championship game.
Ohio State only has a few tough games left on the schedule (Penn St., Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois), all completely winnable.
We’ll probably be underdogs if we make it to the BCS title game, no matter who we play, and that is always a better position to be in (see: 2002, 2006).

I think this could be our year. We could end up playing and undefeated LSU team (one that would have gotten beaten by Florida if not for some go-for-it-on-fourth-downs that went their way) in the national title game. And I like our chances. Go Bucks!

My week 5 picks (a day late, but I didn’t change them)
Last week: 6-8
Overall: 24-22
HOUSTON over Miami
Jacksonville over KANSAS CITY
NY GIANTS over NY Jets
NEW ORLEANS over Carolina
NEW ENGLAND over Cleveland
Detroit over WASHINGTON
TENNESSEE over Atlanta
Arizona over ST LOUIS
PITTSBURGH over Seattle
INDY over Tampa Bay
Baltimore over SAN FRANCISCO
San Diego over DENVER
GREEN BAY over Chicago
Dallas over BUFFALO