The Elephant King aka Tate's movie

Last night, Ric and I went to the world premeire of "The Elephant King" at the TriBeCa Film Festival. I've been wanting to go to the festival for quite some time now, and this was the perfect setting since Tate stars in it. First off, it is a great movie; I mean, sure, Tate rocks and everything but there are some really good performances by other cast members as well, most notably the guy who plays the older brother. Seth Grossman's (director/screen-writer) script doesn't drag at all but moves the plot along at a nice pace. You can tell he knew Thailand pretty well by the way he framed some of the scenes and captured the coloful settings, both at night and during the day. By the way, Tate can flat-out act; the boy had a couple of scenes with Ellen Burstyn(an Oscar winner) and more than held his own. I can tell he was pretty nervous at the premeire especially knowing his parents were about to watch his love scenes...it was pretty funny hearing his parents' reactions to those parts after the movie. From some of the scenes he showed us before, I expected the film to be good but it was better than I had thought. Ric and I want to make shirts that say "Yeah, we know the Elephant King" but I would've felt bad for those who didn't know him...just kidding, I wouldn't have felt bad. Sweet movie, Tate.

games & ice cream

My favorite board game as a kid was Monoploy; we would play this thing for hours until I eventually won by either owning more money than the bank or forcing others to concede out of anger or sheer hopelessness! I'm not kidding either, we were serious about this game...it was all fun and stuff as long as I owned everything. Anyway, Monopoly is coming out with "The Here and Now Edition" in which they will use US landmarks in 22 US cities. The cool thing is that you can be a part of the selection process by voting on the landmarks you want to see in the new edition. Pretty sweet, huh? Speaking of sweet, today is Free Cone Day at Ben & Jerry's. Games, good...ice cream, good...

the haircut

I'm only posting this because people have heavily requested before and after photos, haha...anyway, enjoy. (I think the short hair stuff works best for me.)

the car show

Ric, Torie (with Jonah J), and I went to the car show yesterday and, thankfully, it wasn't crowded. There were all kinds of cars as you can imagine ranging from incredibly ugly ones to crazy hi-tech ones to futuristic concept ones. A few highlights: Lexus unveiled the first vehicle to parallel park itself, Ford has the Reflex which is that silver roadster right there that comes with a built-in baby-seat, and Nissan is coming out with a car that looks like a video-game console on wheels. All the high-end exotic car-makers were there too: Ferrari, Lamborghini, Maserati, Bentley, Maybach...sicness!

Brokeback storage

videos

Thanks to YouTube, I can finally show some of the stuff I've filmed with my digital camera. So far I've included a few of my videos (one from New Orleans, New Year's Eve, and some breakdancin') and a couple of favorites (Bill Hader and the Real Simpsons). And by the way, you can check out the official video made of our trip to New Orleans at the 411; just go to the online media section and select New Orleans Relief Trip. Its an amazing film; Kaiti did such an awesome job especially with the music!

There in the ground His body lay

Light of the world by darkness slain

Then bursting forth in glorious Day

Up from the grave He rose again

And as He stands in victory

Sin’s curse has lost its grip on me

For I am His and He is mine

Bought with the precious blood of Christ

No guilt in life, no fear in death

This is the power of Christ in me

From life’s first cry to final breath

Jesus commands my destiny

No power of hell, no scheme of man

Can ever pluck me from His hand

‘til He returns or calls me home

Here in the power of Christ I’ll stand

Finally, back to normal!

Just got my hair cut! It had not been cut since September when I moved out here...I was trying to hang on until June to cut it when I got home but enough is enough! My head feels so much lighter, I'm so glad this long-hair experiment is over b/c its back to looking decent again.

YouTube

I checked out a very sweet Simpsons video on YouTube about a month ago not realizing how big YouTube was. I had never heard of the site before that and didn't really know what it was about. Needless to say, I do now. YouTube is everywhere...the concept is pretty simple: film yourself or other people doing stuff and put it online for the world to see. You wanna know what the measuring stick is to see if something is big-time or not? Its when Time magazine does a three-page online article about it. There are millions of videos on there ranging from stupid tricks to elaborate films to just crazy stuff captured on tape. Bill Hader from SNL told me he just made a new video a few weeks back thats on there now. So, I go to check it out and discover a bunch of other ones he's made too; I looked up Andy Samberg and found a buttload of stuff he's done with the Lonely Island crew. Viral videos are the new wave of the future making YouTube the new MySpace...

M-V-P!M-V-P!

Yay-yeah! My Lakers are in the playoffs as the 7th seed and will take on the stupid Suns. Before the season began, most people were saying that the tension between Kobe and Phil Jackson will prevent them from winning games or that Kobe doesn't have enough of a supporting cast to be successful in the super competitive Western conference or that Kobe can't do squat w/o Shaq...Well, let's see: Kobe is gonna win the scoring title by getting about 35/game, dropped 81, another 62, some 50's, and a ridiculous string of 40+ games. And oh yeah, they finished above .500 with 44 W's matching the Nuggets record for which Denver won their division. (LA should've gotten the 6th seed but thats just the way the system works.) If you took Kobe out of the the equation, the Lakers are worst than the Bobcats. Seriously, Odom cannot carry that team making Number 8 irreplaceable in LA. You can't say that about the other top two MVP contenders; w/o Nash, the Suns still got Amare and the Matrix and w/o LeBron, the Cavs still have Hughes and the big Z. Phoenix better watch out, my Lakers are clicking at the right time and Kobe is gonna do major damage!

Easter Sunday

This was my first Easter away from home and so I felt a bit sad wearing the traditional tie w/o my family being there but God is good b/c I'm so grateful He has surrounded me with awesome people at the 411 that I was excited to spend the morning celebrating such an incredible day together with all of them. Keith and Anna Beth were kind enough to invite me over for Easter dinner making missing out on my grandma's Easter feast a little easier to bare. Keith is a lucky man b/c Anna Beth can cook like its no tomorrow; I mean, she is absolutely fantastic! They had a pretty cool group of people there from work, church, and the neighborhood. After dinner, we played a good game of Balderdash in which Jerry(who claims he's never played before) won. I had a wonderful being there with good food and good people.

The Exchange

Have you ever heard of "The Great Commission"? You know, where Jesus instructs his disciples to go out into the world and, basically, usher forth His kingdom by discipling, baptizing, spreading the Good News? Anyhow, there's this new ministry opportunity that I'm really excited to be part of that kinda flips that idea around; the 411 and Christian Ministries to the United Nations are partnering up to minister to a group of about 160 United Nations interns from all around the world this summer. The interns range from politician's kids to government officials in training to their own nation's future leaders... so, instead of us going out into the world, the world is coming to us! The opportunity to interact and share with potential world-changing leaders just blows me away; talk about global impact, wow!

seasons of life

After my conversation with some close friends of mine last night about my upcoming trip back home in a couple of months, I realized how much things have changed. There are so many things that'll be different from when I left that I can't help but wonder about the scheme and timing of it all. Its weird when I recall how life was pretty much just moving along for myself, my family and friends for the longest time without any major events and then, within a short period of time, how many new chapters of life all around me have opened or will be opening: I'm in New York, Adam is in San Francisco, Kristi and Craig/Jason and Jen/Ric and Torie are all gonna have kids in the next month or so, Tommy is graduating high school in June and headed to UC Berkeley in Sept., Ronnie and Shaunti are getting married in May, Chase just got back from Iraq, the 411 found more permanent space, no more youth group...trust me, the list goes on. It seems that God decided this was His time to stir things up in our lives and in our faith. I'm just amazed and grateful that He has allowed my journey to be interwoven with the adventures of some amazing people in my life.

YANKEES!

Baseball season officially started yesterday with my Yanks obliterating the A's 15-2! Poor Zito was taken out in the 2nd after serving up a grand slam to A-rod...ha! This is the year, this is the team, baby!