I leave for one weekend and everyone gets delusions of grandeur.

The Cardinals are doing what? King Brian, what strings did you have to pull? Woo also to the Steelers. Even though I am a literate fan first and foremost, it all boils down to wanting to see Mike and Sean duke it out with laser swords. February 1st it is, people.

Also, congrats to Manbeast W for winning first in the wrestling tournament.

But the biggest MVP? My wife. My oldest woke up at 4 this morning sick. My wife woke up with her while I was still groaning, “Why are we up? Why aren’t we sleeping?”

My wife was able to go thanks to Danjo sacrificing and staying behind. We really appreciate it. The house did get built, Jesus was honored, and now for the pictures:


We will have to get photos from other people’s cameras. The first non cellphone pictures that we took were after the house was already up. Oddly enough, all of the ones posted today are from my Nokia.

Is it wrong to be so enamored with a windowsill?

One co-builder mentioned as I shaved the edges of the drywall that he had not seen such a masterpiece since Michelangelo’s David.

With Extreme Home Makeover, we did not see Ty and the crew. We were too busy building a house for people. Irony. I am glad to see that the El Paso paper defended Ruiz against the criticism from talk-radio and Internet goofballs.

Well, this is new:

Last night we had to give over all of our IDs and only one was scanned. Today we had to hand over all of them. They were handed back. We then had to hold the photos up to our faces while the van was opened up. We did not have to file out, which we expect next time. This was on the U.S. side of things.

On the Mexico side, things were tense. I guess 2,000 troops have been deployed to the city this past week. Before we freak out, though, keep in mind that the Juarez cartel is not a new thing, it’s just now getting more coverage through faster communication. Also keep in mind that Juarez is a spread-out city. There’s 1.5 million people in the city. I think I saw maybe 20 troops this weekend. Juarez is bigger than we think. We just get to the edges, where it’s more of a reservation-type landscape.

There was a soldier who was shot this weekend, but it seems like it was a drinking game gone wrong. Everyone was out and about, though, and thankfully my wife caught the word “iglesia” as we got stopped.




(That guy’s armed on the roof.)

With all of this, keep in mind that there are innocent (as much as the rest of us) people in Juarez who need help and need Jesus.

Next MLK weekend: open invitation. Mark your calendars now.

Semi-related posts:

1. Day 1 – Casas
2. Casas – Day 1
3. Casas – Day 1
4. Casas – Day 2
5. Casas – Day 3