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12.18.2006

Of Guitars and Heroes…

Wow! What a weekend! What a week, for that matter.

It was New Noel this past Saturday. For those that don’t know already, new noel is Community Worship’s Christmas service. This year, as Interim Worship Leader, it was my responsibility to plan.

I hope those that know me well are at least smiling by this point, as that sinks in. I actually had a ton of ideas for the service—it was the pulling everything off that I was worried about. But pull it off we did—at the last minute, no less—and the evening went rather well. At least, people told me they really enjoyed it. I’m rather inclined to assume people were just being charitable, since they knew how hard I had worked…but I hope people really did enjoy it. Mostly, I hope that it was something unique and meaningful, and that it left them thinking about “God With Us.”

After that was all over, Sunday we had our 20somethings Christmas party. That was fun. It was a potluck (or “providence plate” as some are fond of calling it). We did an ornament gift exchange (most of them were home-made, and some were very cool).

After a little while, the guys (that includes my brother Kyle) pulled out the playstation. This is normally the point in the afternoon where I say “sayonara” and go hang with the girls. But…the game they pulled out was Guitar Hero. I had only played it once, very badly, and when I first heard of it I thought it was rather stupid. I play guitar. Why do I need to pretend on a video game?

But…I play guitar. I love guitars. Guitars used to be an obsession with me. I once had a pair of fingernail clippers shaped like a guitar (a souvenir from my Branson days). And the guys looked like they were having fun. So…I hung out a while longer. Some of the other girls came over (you need to understand that the rest of these said ‘girls’ are all married, and their husbands were several of the guys now clustered around the TV).

My friend Katie admitted that she had played a few times at home with her husband Josh and enjoyed it. So we decided to give it a try. I should also add that normally at this point, it is hard to get guys to give the girls a turn, but this was not the case. We were cheered on and encouraged; the guitar-controllers were joyfully handed over to us.

I did awful, as you might expect. Just as I was feeling like an idiot, my friend James commented to the rest of the group, “At least Jessica can take comfort in the fact that she can actually play the guitar. The rest of us can only play on that thing.” It made me feel loads better. (Thanks, James!) —By the way, James was undoubtedly THE Guitar Hero. He blew everybody else away. He and Kyle even played the “Trogdor” song on GH2, which is crazy hard (but so hilarious!!)

Yes, I can play the guitar (I prefer acoustic), but I can’t do any of the fancy finger work that makes for a good rock song. So it is kind of fun to pretend for a second that I could be a rock star. I think it’s that kind of fantasy fulfillment that makes the game so popular. I’m gonna have to keep practicing so that when our New Year’s Eve-Eve party rolls around, I won’t feel ashamed of my virtual instrumentation.

On that note (ha! bah-dum-ching!) I’ll leave you with this famous rocker quote:

“Be excellent to each other…

…and, PARTY ON, DUDES!”

Thank you! Goodnight! I’ll be here all week!

12.08.2006

Friday Surprise!!

Okay, I have something I would like to share with you. I've been keeping it to myself for a while, mostly to see how things would turn out. Now, before you get all excited, let me explain. It's just a blog.

You read that correctly: I have a new blog.

No, I'm not abandoning this one, not by any means. Why on earth, then, would I be starting a new one? The answer is quite simple: I was asked to.

I saw recently that an online music community called hearitfirst was looking for some blog writers. I "applied" so to speak, sending samples of my writing...earlier posts from this very blog. And they accepted me! I guess I'll be writing for them pretty regularly...they just published my first post, and I've already been given an assignment for next week.

Hearitfirst.com is all about Christian music (Sorry, Brianne! Maybe I'll find a way to mention Nickel Creek, Imogen or Damien yet, though). They have a few different blogs on different topics. The blog I'll be writing for is a "Spiritual Growth" blog. Does that sound as intimidating to you as it does to me???

Anyway, I just wanted to share the news. Happy Friday, Everyone!