New Beginnings

Not many of you readers know...
but I, Isaac, am working my last few days at Interlinc.

Interlinc is the reason that we moved out to TN. We thought that by taking this job that it was THE reason God brought us out to TN. But we soon knew that it was just a means by which He would use us here in TN. We are very grateful for the job that brought us out here to where we now consider home.

It is actually going to be weird for me to get up and go to work and it not be Interlinc. I have been working there for 2.9 years now and it has always been a constant in my life here in TN. So yea...it'll be quiet weird.

I am moving on to a health care company called Passport Health Communications. And I am really excited to work in a place that is not considered a "Christian" workplace. It feels like i have been in this bubble for sooooooo long now. First with being at school at HPU then working for interlinc...it's like they are their own little worlds. Does that make sense? I don't want Christianity to be the popular thing all around me, all the time. Maybe some people out there in the middle of non-Christians are saying "I would love to be working in a Christian workplace!" But I am past that at this point in time of my life. I need to get out there where my actions are going to be evident. Where my words are not just hot air, wasted, with nothing to back them up.
I guess that is the whole reason I now have a skewed view of Christian music and Christian artist. Not that it is completely negative...just skewed. Main thing is that when artists say that their music is a ministry, it is, but to a certain point. The music industry, Christian or not, is a flat out business. You can call it a ministry all you want but it is still essentially a business at the end of the day. So, it is all dependent on sales...and so was the case at Interlinc. Not that the products were not good, it's just that the vision was blurred.

So I am ready to go somewhere to work where the words ministry, kingdom, and missional goals aren't used in the same context or at all. I hope to be a great employee and be a great asset to the new company and be a little salt and light to everyone around me. So I can only hope to be that salt and light to people. I look forward to not working in the Christian bubble that i have been in for so long and stretch my wings.

wish me luck!

Atmosphere

This past weekend we packed our car and headed Southeast to the great city of Atlanta. Or as some refer to it "Hotlanta" or the "ATL" Well it wasn't really hot so 'Hotlanta' was not used this weekend. (and actually we packed our friend Mandy's car...since she let us borrow her jeep SUV to bring back some purchases)

We were going to meet our Amy's Dad and our step-mom in ATL for the weekend and hangout. But we also decided to leave extra early Saturday morning to go to one of our favorite stores (and the reason we borrowed Mandy's jeep)...

Mention that store and ATL
...we are on board!

So we made a few purchases and it worked out b/c as we were checking out...the 'rents had gotten to their hotel and were waiting on us. So we packed the car and went to find the hotel. Which was tough since we aren't too familiar with downtown Atlanta and had minimal directions to follow. But we found it and it was quite a spectacular hotel

We didn;t really see the outside of it but when we walked into the lobby from a walkway that lead us from the parking garage...we saw this...
That blue sail looking piece is the top of a bar area called Pulse, I think. And so the inside of the hotel was hollow and all the floors were visible from the first floor and then you could see sky lights (which you cannot see in that picture) all the way at the top of the building. So it was really a cool view.

So we all went out to dinner and then decided to go to the hotel sports bar and grill to watch the Texas football game. You know...it was the 2nd college football week of the year/season...and I spent the morning driving in a car 4 hours. Spent another 1 and 1/2 hours shopping and so on...and not once remembered that I was missing College Game Day and football games on ESPN. So when our dad said we needed to catch the Texas game...it hit me. FOOTBALL!
So we got lucky that it was a big place...and it was really nice...
This was the entrance to is and we were all the way in the back where they had 5 projection screens with 5 different games on. It made up for not watching anything before that that day. And lucky for us there were a few other people from TX there (they weren't all Texas fans...TAMU and TCU) but it was good to have natives present.

Texas won after a slow 1st half so we were all happy!

Well our trip to ATL was great and it was really good to hang out with the 'rents!
We had to head back to TN by noon to be back that evening. So it was a short trip...but a great trip. A good little getaway from our normal hustle and bustle is always nice, verrry nice!

Reason Why

...oh yea. The reason why the last posting ended abruptly was because while we were at the base of the waterfall. The camera for the first time since we bought it has no battery power left. So no more pictures = no more blog posting. You only get what we got.

Also blogger was not being very cooperative with that last posting. Or maybe I was tired and the long day away from electronics came into effect which inhibited me from using the computer and internet efficiently. If it's the latter... I have issues.




There was no Monday this work week. AWESOME!

Sky Blue Sky

Today was a beautiful day and it was great to be outdoors under the blue sky. Friday night we had planned on going somewhere to hike for Labor Day. Turns out we decided on Fall Creek Falls State Park & Resort.
That park is known for having the tallest waterfall east of the Rockies. That is clearly enough reason to go...right? Bet your bottom dollar it is! So we set off bright and early today. But you can't start a day of hiking without some breakfast, so we all met at a convenient local Cracker Barrel for some good morning eats.

Great drive and we finally got there around 10:30am got all of our gear ready (we packed lunches to eat on the trails) and off we went and hit the trails!


I don't know how many of you all know this (actually I did mention this in my last posting) but TN has been low on the rainfall for the summer months. So we had been talking about how the waterfalls might just look like your ordinary neighborhood cliff...or gorge....because there would be NO water to provide the waterfall we wanted to see.

Well low and behold there was water falling!

The little white dots there at the bottom are some people.

The overlook where i took those pictures of the waterfall was really high so here's is a picture of us with some distance. It's a good one!

Well from that overlook we took the rigorous trail to the base of the waterfall. It was not rigorous going down but we knew climbing back up was going to be cramping our style, literally. The base of the waterfall was worth the trip though being in the gorge surounded by earth, rock, and trees was incredible. So we actually sat down there on the rocks and ate our lunches. Relaxing in the coolness of the shade the gorge provided and hearing the water fall down was just what we needed. Here we are chillin' on our rocks.

The Wall

...actually more like the fence. But whatev


So finally...FINALLY (that looks weird in all caps) here ate pictures of our fence that our wonderful Dad and brothers built for us! I'm actually glad that we waited to even take these dang pictures because the grass has been brown most of the summer because of our water drought here in TN. So finally it rained more than once in a week and out grass greened up enough to look decent. Actually it looks amazing in these pics.

The front of left side of the house, or as we refer to it as the non-street side. And you can clearly see why.





Then of course this is the street side of the house. If you were also wondering yes I had cut the yard recently, the day before actually and yes I still cannot grow any stinkin' grass on the sides of the house.

And now 3 pics of the backyard...in all it's glory.

I had actually just finished mowing the backyard and you can see the tracks on the pavement from the lawn mower. I cut the yard on 2 different days because the back so so stinkin' tall that it would have taken me all of yesterday to do. So being the smarty pants I am...split it into two days. (I really only did it b/c we had plans both afternoons, don't let me fool you into thinking I really am a smarty pants)

Tomorrow is Labor Day which
= NO WORK!
= 4 day work week!
= happy Isaac & Amy!

And everyone wants a happy Isaac & Amy around
...especially Bugsy and Rupert.