Dear John

Well, I got a generic email from Farmers saying:
Thank you for your interest in our company and your recent submission to our Waco, TX (Abilene) - Property Claims Representative position.
We have reviewed your resume and have decided to continue our search for candidates whose skills and experience more closely match the position. We encourage you to review other open positions at our career site and wish you the best of success in your career search.
Thank you.
I'm a bit disappointed and feel a little deceived. If they didn't think I was qualified simply based on my resume, they should have told me so 3 steps ago before I spent hours filling out questionnaires and applications and driving to Lubbock and back.

This whole Farmers thing strikingly resembles a dating relationship that sputters out just as it's getting off the ground. You know the kind. After a few good dates and lots of flirting (maybe you even hang out with her friends), you're thinking about maybe making it "official", having a DTR (Determine The Relationship) and becoming bf/gf, but then out of nowhere comes, "oh, by the way, I don't like you. But, I still wanna be friends"... Not that that's happened to me before or anything...ahem.

So anyways, that's about how I feel right now, and I'm back to square one again... again. I definitely need some prayer help for some perseverance and encouragement.

Three Flats in Three Days (beat that!)

I know all of you are dying to know about how my job search is going, so I'll tell you. A couple weeks ago, I put in an application for a Claims Representative at Farmers Insurance. I've put in other apps, but I don't really want those jobs. Last week, a guy from Farmers called me and emailed me a questionnaire to fill out. After I emailed it back, he called me back and I had a phone interview. Then, on Monday, I drove to Lubbock, of all places, and took 4 tests: grammar, communication, math and personality. The first 3 were pass/fail, and I guess the personality test was subjective. Can you really fail a personality test? Anyways, the lady told me I was only the 2nd applicant to pass the 3 tests. So, I should have a face-to-face interview very soon. If I get this job, I'll have a 2 week training in L.A., then 2 weeks of training on the job somewhere outside of Abilene. I'd also get a company car, laptop and digital camera plus sweet benefits and stuff.

In the last 3 days, I've had 3 flat tires. I'm dead serious. On Sunday, the back-left tire on my car went flat. I put on the spare. On Monday, the spare went flat. On Tuesday, I went bike riding and the front tire on my bicycle went flat! (I didn't have a spare either) I couldn't believe it. This is just bizarre. It feels like God's trying to tell me something or the enemy's trying to discourage me. Either way, I have no clue why I've had 3 flats in 3 days. I'm praying I'll be flatless today and break the streak and/or God will shed a little light on the situation. Something else I should add is that I got a flat in almost the exact same spot (11 miles out) the last time I rode out to Ft. Phantom Lake 3 years ago. Weird.

I wonder if there's some sort of World Record that I can break...

Sneeze of Death No More

This last weekend I headed to Brownwood, TX for a missions retreat hosted by the Halbert Institute for Missions (read ACU) also known as H.I.M. (they're so clever). If you didn't know, I've been strongly considering joining Mark and Katrina Willis (and possibly others) in moving to Chicago next summer/fall to take part in what God's doing there. I'm not going to say 100% that I'm moving there, but I'm definitely keeping my ears open for that possibility. The retreat was pretty intense- not in the playing rugby kind of way. They hit us with 6 hours of lectures, discussions and tests on Friday night, then another 12 hours of the same on Saturday. Needless to say, by the time 9 p.m. and the 9th self-evaluating test rolled around, I was toast. Although it was a bit exhausting, it was definitely fruitful. It gave the Willis clan and I (and sometimes others) some great time to have some needed discussions, thought-sharing, and relationship building.

Something awesome happened the other day. I sneezed. It was unlike any other sneeze ever experienced by any man even to grace the planet earth with his/her rocket-propelled snot, I mean... it was,well... normal, which is what was awesome about it. That's right. It didn't make me tear up or groan or anything. It felt so good I proceeded to sneeze 3 more times. Boo-yuh.

I don't know what's been up lately, but my sleeping schedule has been jacked up. It seems I can only sleep between the hours of 2 a.m. and 8 a.m. I'm lucky if I get more than 5 hours. The latest installment of jacked-up-ness was this morning. I woke up at freakin 5 a.m.! I was wide awake and hatin life. I popped in a CD thinking I could ease back into sleep, but no-a-o. So I popped in CD #2 to no avail. I gave in and got out of bed at 7, played some guitar and decided to attempt my first jog since 0 A.D. (Almost Death). I geared up and headed for my old friend, the ACU jogging track (the 2 mile series of sidewalks circumnavigating campus). It was nice and cool and there was some sweet fog limiting vision to 20 feet. After much strain and heavy breathing, I completed 1 single lap (2 whole miles) without stopping. It felt so good. I guess I can start training for that marathon now. I snagged a shower then headed to Monks for a chai latte, a little Bible reading and some writing. Ephesians was so good this time through. Although it's not my preference to wake up at 5 a.m., it was a pretty good way to start the day. I can't complain.

"The Big Country"

It still gets me every time when someone, usually on the radio or TV, refers to Abilene and/or West Texas as "the big country". Haha. So anyways...

It's been great to be a little more active this week. Last night I played ultimate frisbee for a couple hours. I prewarned all the players I wouldn't be doing too much running due to being shot and stuff. After playing a while, I got to where I could jog without hurting too much. The problem arose when I reached out to catch a touchdown and did a roll (don't worry I scored). The roll didn't feel all that great, but that triggered some nasty allergies. For the next hour, I fought the urge to sneeze (because it still hurts a lot) to no avail. Finally the battle subsided after showering. I also geared up and went for a bike ride this afternoon. I was cruisin along at 18 mph or so and feelin pretty good, so I figured I'd go to Hodges, 11 miles away, and then come back. What I realized after turning around what there was a reason for the first half ease. Apparently, I had a nice 15 mph tail wind (which translates into a 15 mph head wind) and more down hills than up on the way out. I had much time to ponder upon my miscalculation for the next hour as I trudged back to Abilene, just barely finishing my 22.23 mile ride. Nevertheless, it feels so good to be tired from exercising and not just from walking 15 ft.

Another little fun thing that happened today was coming back to my house this morning, after doing some bike accessory shopping, to find the power off. Good times. When I changed the electricity over to my name earlier in the week, they informed me the wouldn't be able to accomplish this until Monday. Gotta love it. Thankfully I have gracious friends, the Pattersons, who are letting me crash at their place while they're gone this weekend.

In other news, I'm still looking for a job. I'd love some prayers for that. Thanks.