Support is Important

Having a baby is challenging. It's hard work, but it's not the physical work that's tough (at least not yet), but it's the emotional side of things. The frustration of not knowing if you are doing something right, of not being able to tell what he wants when he fusses or cries. My respect for single parents has increased one hundred fold since becoming a dad. It's a tough job, and going at it alone is just unfathomable to me.

Our biggest challenge has been not having much in the way of a support network around us. At least not in the immediate vicinity. Both of our immediate families live multiple provinces away, and while we do have extended family in the city, I find it really difficult to ask for help.

I thought we were developing a decent support network here. Going to church, having a small group, making friends... but it has all seemed so distant these past two weeks. Bean was born two weeks ago today, and we've haven't had much in the way of visitors. I mean my parents surprised us with a visit the weekend after he was born, and what a HUGE blessing that was, and a couple of friends from out of town who just happened to be in town that weekend dropped in, but other than that, we've had no one.

I dunno, I guess I just expected more, which maybe I shouldn't, but I thought at times when there's a birth or death that the community comes together and helps those people out. I mean we've missed the last two Sundays at church and haven't heard a peep from anyone. That's not true, one person gave us a phone call and congratulated us which was really nice.

Maybe technology is getting in the way? When Bean was born I let everyone know on facebook, and posted a couple of pictures, and the messages and comments on my status poured in. It was really nice, but that's where it stopped. Other than from a couple of really close friends, nobody even called. Nobody offered to drop by with dinner or to visit (things i thought just happened, especially in churches). Maybe I'm being a little old fashioned, but commenting on someone's status is nowhere near the same as calling them on the phone, or dropping in to see them. But I think people have gotten comfortable sending greetings and congratulations from afar and the personal interaction has been left behind. It's so much easier to type "Congrats!" than to pick up the phone and call, or drop by and see how things are going.

Now, I know I'm just having a little pity party for myself over here, I just expected more. And maybe I shouldn't have. Maybe the relationships that we have cultivated just aren't at that point yet. Or maybe I just need to learn to ask...There was just so much love and support prior to the birth, I thought it would continue. I think it's the fact that the extent of most people's comments were a reply to a status update. That's not enough.

It'll get better though. Hopefully we'll make it to church on Sunday and reconnect with people there, and Jo's parents are coming in Sunday afternoon for a couple of weeks. It'll be a good thing, though I'm sure trying at times. ;) I love my inlaws, they just drive me nuts sometimes. But then most people do, and living with them for a couple of weeks just amplifies things. lol It'll be great for the love and support though, just what we need right now.

School Sticker Shock!

So I got a bit of a shock yesterday when I looked into going back to school. I just want to go back part-time, 2 or 3 classes per semester, and finish my Theology degree so that I can go on to become a Pastor. Seeing as how September is quickly drawing to a close, I figured I'd start getting the details on applying for school and getting the ball rolling. Then I saw tuition costs. I'd looked at the University of Winnipeg (UofW), and Manitoba (UofM) in the past and tuition for a 3 credit course (standard) was just under $300 which was fine and I figured we could afford for me to take 2 classes come January.

Then I look at Canadian Mennonite University's tuition, $590 for a 3 credit hour course! That's double what it costs to do a degree at either of the other universities in town. So then I look a little closer at the other schools to see if I'm missing something. It turns out that while a 3 credit hour course in the Faculty of Arts is only $285, a 3 credt hour course in the Faculty of Theology is $585. Umm... what?!?! How does that work? The only people going into the Faculty of Theology are potential ministry candidates; people that aren't looking to make a lot of money. So why does it cost double to get a degree to go into ministry as it does to get a normal Arts or Science degree. And then seminary ends up being $900-1300 per class.

It was a bit of a kick in the nuts. So I'm figuring when it's all said and done, we'll be shelling out about $1500 for me to go back to school in January. Which is a good $500 more than we had planned on spending. I know we can make it work, and we'll just make some cuts in other areas. We, like most people, aren't always the greatest with our spending habits, but I like to think that we've really improved over the past couple of years.

So, I guess we'll make it work, it just really sucks. It'll cost me just as much to become a pastor as it would to become a doctor, and I'll make less than a third. Now I know people don't become pastors for the money, but that's a HUGE debtload to take on for a career path that pays a mere pittance in comparison to an equally costly education. No wonder there is a pastor shortage, not many people are going to accept a debtload like this for such little monetary pay off. It's not like it is buying me a ticket to Heaven; that's free and available to anyone.

Prayers would be greatly appreciated as we make some pretty big transitions in the next few months. Mama Bean is due in about 4 weeks, I'll be off work for 9 months starting December 1st, and I'm hoping to be taking a couple of classes starting in January. It's going to be a busy time, but I'm really looking forward to it all.

Work Frustrations

My job isn't so much stressful as it is frustrating. All summer it has been 3 steps forward and 2 steps back; slowly gaining ground while simultaneously wasting a whole shit-load of time. I'm not sure if it is like this every summer/fall, but it's pretty bad this year.

Typically we sit at about 100-120 open tickets between all 25 schools in our division. Right now we are just over 400, with over 25% of them being from my school. My school does NOT make up 25% of the population of the division, but it does include about 25% of the princesses.

There are a lot of things that can be improved on, and should have been done years ago, but for some reason we run around in circles with our thumbs up our collective asses. I mean, at the very least we should have a test environment. We are a large organization, how can we not run changes through a test environment before going live? No large organization roles out huge server, system, and software upgrades without thoroughly testing it. I mean seriously... It is so frustrating some times.

Today, just as I thought I was starting to get ahead, someone makes a change and sets me back hours of work. I had already been there almost two hours longer than I was supposed to be there when it happens. I've been going in an hour early everyday to try and get caught up, but I keep getting kicked back.

My goal is to have less than 50 tickets by the end of the week, so we'll see. I'll keep working hard, and get shit done and that's about all I can do.

One of God's creatures my ass

So almost every morning round about 5am I am awoken by one of God's wonderful creatures that sits in a tree in my neighbors yard and starts whistling. Now it isn't pretty, or musical, or lovely. It is a two-tone whistle that is repeated every 2 seconds for usually over 30 minutes.

Now the first morning this happened I got so pissed off that I went and slept in the basement until it was time to get up at 7 (when my lovely wife came down and woke me up).

The next morning I dragged a fan into our bedroom hoping the white noise would be enough to drown it out. I was wrong, and laid in bed fuming until it shut up.
The following morning I went to find ear plugs, which I couldn't, then went outside to find it and yell at it, throw rocks and sticks at it, whatever, but couldn't find it. I was so tired I fell back asleep anyway. That night I dug through my stuff until I found some earplugs and put them beside my bed.

I now use those earplugs almost every morning, and have gotten quite adept at putting them in. I hear that fucking bird, I roll over, get them in in about 5 seconds, and am back to sleep in under 10 seconds. But still...having to wake up every morning because of that fucking bird? I'm going to shoot it one of these days...if I can find it.

God might make all the creatures of this earth, and they might all be special, but I want to fucking kill this bird.