OK. I’m one day late. But you’ll have to forgive me because I was down in Saint John for the conference there this past weekend and just returned late last night. The conference was wonderful. I love getting together with the YP which I have not seen in such a long time. The Readings were on the book of Ruth, and both practical and profitable for the time. I also especially enjoyed the talk in the Open Meeting on the assembly and the ground of gathering. I think too often our eyes are focused on ourselves and we need to have this focus redirected all too often. It was encouraging. Today also marks the day when I move into our new house, as well as having my younger brother live with me. I guess that means lots of interesting things in the days to come. This coming weekend I hope to make it down the Montrose conference and I’ll let you know how that goes. Smile all.

Oops. Did I miss a week there? I’m sorry. And I don’t even have the excuse that I was travelling although I did just fly in from Manhatten last night after spending the weekend with my brother. Anyway, I’m excited because this week my family intends to be in the area most of the time so I should be seeing lots of them. I know I’m spoiled because I was just home for two weeks one month back, but it’s summer vacation and that means spending time with family. Speaking of which, when I was down in NY this past weekend, I was able to spend some time lounging out on the beaches of Long Island. I think I’d forgotten how much I love the beach and bodysurfing in the waves. It was most wonderful. This coming weekend, I intend DV to make it down to Saint John for the conference there. The only question is: bike or car?

Maybe instead of just putting the date on a weekly basis, I should be putting my current location as well. For instance, I was in San Francisco last weekend, and I’m currently in Charlotte, North Carolina right now sending this on my lunch break. This landscape is incredible – like out of the Old South. I’m so excited because tonight I get to see someone who I’ve been dying to see for the longest time (since last Christmas) and one of my best friends. I’m driving up to see her tonight, and, if only for three or four hours, I’m thankful that I can make it up there. This past weekend was a lot of fun and I’m so glad I could make it to Montreal YP. The meetings were and I especially enjoyed the second one on “sacrifices”. After just finishing the book “Lords of the Earth”, the meaning of these thoughts certainly took on a thought provoking light. There are many sac rifices that I can offer to the One who gave His all for me. Like that little children’s song says, “Make me a servant, Humble and meek, Lord let me lift up, Those who are weak.” There are lots more thoughts on sacrifices I could share, and I wish I could send you a copy of the meeting. Smile all.

Do you know what it’s like to see a sunset heading west from 33,000 feet? Absolutely and awe-inspiringly beautiful!! Yipper, I’m currently in San Francisco, California after teaching my first day of a three day course in a downtown building – just miles from the Golden Gate bridge. It seems strange to wake up to a $37 breakfast after skipping breakfast yesterday and breaking bread in Nepean, Ontario. Should I also mention that my brain should be in vacation mode as well because it’s currently a civic holiday in Canada for us? Oh well, I look forward to another weekend coming like this past one where I spent all Saturday waterskiing and swimming and playing volleyball and just generally bumming around in Rideau Ferry. Only this time it will be at Montreal YP weekend. That will be wonderful and I shouldn’t complain about missing holidays. In fact, I’m thankful for everything that I’ve been given. The Lord is truly wonderful and Love.

So I just got to experience my first quarter end. When I say that, I mean that the company that I work for has pressure to make a certain target and sales in order to meet projected earnings. I suppose that sometimes this might not be at all fun, but this time it was both exciting and interesting. So that was the big event for the week. No wait, the big event for the week is that I’m now officially Danny Allan of no fixed address. For the month of August, I will be a floater, a street bum. I moved out of 30 Sutton on Saturday and said good-bye to my residence of two years at 19:00. It was a bit sad to walk through the rooms, now completely empty, and realize that this was the last time I would see them – sort of like saying good-bye to an old friend. Oh well, the house that we move into in September is much nicer and cost no more, so I’m looking forward to that. Smile!

What a week this past week was. I now know that the environment between the Academic world and a Software Development world is completely and one hundred percent different, but not in a bad way. You might say that the learning curve is almsot vertical, but not impossible to climb. IN fact, I very much enjoy working with the challenges and bumps that come along. This past weekend, myself and two friends of mine headed up to my sister’s cottage in the Muskoka area and I got to relax and just do nothing for the weekend in the sun. It was the first time I was really able to just kick back at a cottage this summer and it felt wonderful. (It was also the first trip in my new car – did I mention the new car before?) Anyway, I’m back in Ottawa again for an extremely busy week while I move everything out of the house for this Thursday, and move (temporarily) in with my uncle for the month of August. Lots of things happening … Smile!

And here I’ve been working for the company Watchfire now for over a week. I was afraid I might lose this site through the University, but it doesn’t look like I will, at least in the near future. Should it ever be taken from me, I will attempt to give a one week notice and move this over to another location, but for now this is where everyone expects it to be and I can’t see changing it unless I need to. 🙂 It’s been wonderful. The learning curve here has been exponential and I’m finally after one week beginning to understand what it is that we produce and market. I must say that it’s quite a challenge moving from a University (Supportive mode) to here (Productive mode). Regardless, the most important factor is that I be where my Saviour wishes me to be and that I do all things heartily as unto Him. Sometimes I think I might lose my focus as to why we’re on this earth. Considering that we’re only here for a “drop in the bucket” of time, or a brief vapour, it’s important to “redeem the time”. I’ve been reading a book recently (a few actually) called “If there is a God, Why are there atheists”, and although it’s not exactly on these lines, I find it extremely fascinating. Perhaps when I finish, I’ll post a few of the thoughts from it. I guess however, that we don’t get caught up with much learning either. Instead, our focus should be heavenward. Smile.

So I’ve been out of contact with the world for the past three weeks and I’m starting to receive nasty emails asking me what’s wrong with me. 🙂 OK, so I could offer some excuses, but let me just do the briefest of brief overviews and maybe you can understand. Over the past three weeks, I’ve been home in Stellarton for one week, in NFLD for a conference for five days, finished two major projects for Carleton University, and put over 3000 km on my motorcycle. And that’s not even to mention the fact that I’m currently unemployed for the first time in over four years. Putting things in perspective, I hope you can understand that I’ve been a little on the busy side. You’ll have to forgive me for not changing the picture this week as I don’t have CorelDraw on this computer at home, and I no longer have access to the computers at Carleton. But does this mean I’m down and depressed? Not at all!! The Lord is wonderful and I had an extremely encouraging time in NFLD. I’m so glad that I went. Maybe next week if I have time, I can give a little outline on the meetings. Smile!

Today I had the dubious distinction of single-handedly unleashing the ILOVEYOU virus on the entire Carleton University network. Needless to say, it has been less than a wonderful day. And while the actual propogation was not technically my fault, it stills remains to be seen that almost all users on the network received the virus from my account. Oops. The ironic thing is of course, that I do not have the virus myself, and had I been working on my computer this would not have happened. Oh well, it made for an interesting hour or two as we scrambled to shut down the SendMail servers and filter the email. Speaking of filtering, we had the latest virus updates running and while they recognized and quarantined the messages, they were still sent anyway. I guess we can chalk that one bug up to someone externally. 🙂 At least I’m not alone … As for this past weekend, I guess it was the first one in six that I was here in Ottawa. It felt good to actually catch up on sleep. Smile all.

This weekend I was down in Toronto for the YP weekend. On Friday, I left shortly after noon to drive down to my sister’s house and my nephew’s one year old birthday. I almost didn’t take my bike because of the threat of rain, but although the ominous clouds never disappeared, it was a cold but dry drive down. On Friday night, there was ringette at the rink there, followed by a general bonfire that night. Saturday morning began at 07:30 when the guys hit the ice for some full contact hockey. You would never think you could chase 30 guys from the bed for something so early in the morning, but they were all dressed and ready to go at 07:30. The day was non-stop activities and was lots of fun. The three meetings were on Jonah and were excellent, bringing up some thoughts and ideas that I had never seen or heard before, but were more than a little applicable to me. After fellowship tea and a meeting yesterday, most of the YP dispersed to their various ways and Rob, Mats and I headed back to Ottawa in just a minor downpour. I can be thankful for the prayers and safety, for we made it home both safe and dry (rainsuits can be wonderful) last night. OK. So we were a little tired, but it was an encouraging and nice weekend just the same.