Progress or Death

Miles Run:72.05

Miles Biked:85.99
Total Miles:158.04
Stadium Stairs Run*:2244
Steep Steps Run*:1340
Days to Rainier:132
Summit Team:9.55
Aspirin Tablets:42

This week I had a conversation on the topic of organizational effectiveness, missional relevance, and what death looks like in an human institution. David provided some great insight and helped me to flesh out my own version of the Theory of the Firm.
During my time at Hillsdale College, I explored the strict Austrian view of Industrial Organization. They relied on the assumptions of human self-interest and the predictability of the natural desires for personal advancement. These desires in a properly architected organization can theoretically lead to the organization's benefit, the individual's benefit, and an expansion in overall production in the broader economy. Now how does this apply to the Security Team at the West Seattle Campus of Mars Hill Church?
I am blessed with the chance to serve with amazing folks in West Seattle who sacrifice their time to serve coffee, assist people's parking, and image Jesus.
So in an organization like Mars, what does a well-crafted system look like?
My conclusions, which have been heavily influenced by a bit of reading in this field, is that there are three phases in any organization: innovation, management, and death. In the innovation stage, the organization is infused with a vision of what can be done and pursues it. In the management phase the mission is accomplished, the passion is depleted, and the third phase is irrevocably imminent. When I say death, I mean that the organization still exists, but no progress is possible with current systems, the size will continue to dwindle, and though it may take 40 years (until all the people die off) there is only futile, stubborn mediocrity leading to closure.
Let's do a case study! The U.S. Postal Service. Back before letter carriers (calling them mail-men is not politically correct) decided to shoot people at random (40 people have been shot by on-duty USPS employees in the last 28 years), this organization was founded with enthusiasm to serve America in a noble profession. Benjamin Franklin[1] started a small-scale postal service in Philadelphia, 1775. After incorporation into the government under the newly ratified Constitution, the Post Office Department was created in 1792. So where has the institution come since some bright-eyed young men started delivering grandmother's birthday cards to young Philadelphia school children?

Well, as reported in the 2009 historical table from President Obama's Executive Office (Page 61) [2] the Postal Service will lose another $4.5 Billion this year and over $5 billion by next year. I find it humorous that USPS brags about its self-sufficiency...except for the little $4+ billion a year it has to borrow from the goventment because it is an obese organization. A brief survey of future initiatives laid down by Patrick R. Donahoe (the current PMG) shows management is the current phase of the organization. Their is no vision for the future, no innovation. The organization exists to continue its own existence. Basically, the organization is bound to slowly die over generations because it has no purpose, no passion.

Look around your neighborhoods (if you live in Seattle), there are a ten managerial/dying churches for every one innovative church[3]. So what does this look like in WS? Well, every team at Mars is designed to be a missional entity looking to share the gospel. We are totally flexible in the way to organize the teams; when a better idea comes along we adapt. Each leader under my oversight is free to direct their team as they desire (providing they still respect the aforementioned timeless truths. When a new leader is raised up, the first thing I tell them is, "Look for your replacement" because leading is not about getting a comfy role and then stagnating; it's about passionately pouring into others so they become better disciples of Jesus. If there is a highly-talented person on any team, we grab them, pour into them, and raise them up to lead as their abilities and gifts enable them. We look for new ideas to contextualize the message to our neighborhoods; we have a stated goal for a church campus of 2,000 people. (BTW that would put our little campus of Mars Hill into the top 400 churches nation-wide) I believe if we reach 2,000 folks and say, "Sweet, we have arrived, let's take a breather", then we have failed. We cannot give up progress and die. We must continually innovate even though it will certainly be uncomfortable, hard, unpopular, and exhausting.

Speaking of exhausting, my awesome cousin Tanya is running her second Marathon tomorrow. It is the 33rd Annual Napa Vally Marathon. She is amazing.

My training this week is a mere spark compared to the bonfire of a marathon, but I managed 21.31 miles in three runs including my longest run to date covering more than eight-and-a-half miles. I found out that the ringing in my ears is likely due to aspirin. So my fun pill statistic may be soon sacked. My internship is fun and challenging and I got a chance to work with the newest census data just released this week. Very cool. Oh...and now I have footnotes!

_______________________

1 - He was the biggest name is chess in Colonial America. Very Cool. I highly recommend his autobiography

2 - http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy09/pdf/hist.pdf

3 - innovative is intended to convey a forward-looking passionate goal setting that is based on timeless truths in scripture, not a whoring (Jesus' words not mine) church who is trying to draw a crowd but doesn't care about truth.

One Step Leads to Another

I took my first step toward Rainier on Suturday. Then there was another, and another, and before I knew it I was running. Have I ever told you how much I hate to run? I'm not even joking; the last time I ran was for the mile run in 6th grade. (7:12 for the smallest kid in the 1600 person middle school ain't bad)
My dad was a bicyclist, and my mom is an aikido black belt. So I should have some athleticism. Not so. I couldn't even make the baseball team in high school as a bench warmer. It's not that I don't go out side and exercise, it's just that I am very short, and if I am not intentional about planning out each meal, I lose 3 pounds a week.
So back to the point, I hate running. But...the training routine I have chosen on is a 5 a week Bike/Run routine. My first run covered 4.3 miles but I actually ran only 3.2 miles. It was raining and windy and cold. How can people do this stuff for fun? Each time I saw a dude walking his dog or an elderly lady peering from behind lace curtains I wanted to quit. My fear of man popped out as I imagined what they were thinking...{Old Lady's voice}"Crazy hoodlum, running must be looting..." {dude's voice} "Woah, crazy runner doesn't he know it's raining out here?"
Each time my heart would sink, I thought of this picture and the passion tripled within:

I want to see this with my own eyes, I want to be there and I want to summit.
{Using Pastor Mark's Intense Voice} "I'm looking for Men and Women who want the same thing Passionately, Who want to stand high atop Rainier and Earn it!"

Who is even moderately interested in coming with me? We hit rainer Mid July. It will take months of personal preparation. You might even have to run. It will take months of group events to hone your technical skills. It will take a lot of your time and probably $300-$450. Do you want it bad enough?


Special acknowledgements to my Cousin Tanya, she decided to take up running and now kills marathons. She is an inspiration to me.

Storming Castillo de san Marcos in St. Augustine

Miles: 10335.6
Gallons Burned: 340.2
Caffeinated Drinks: 65
Gigabytes of Pictures: 27.9

I'm in New York. It's awesome. People from everywhere, culture being made everywhere, life in every stage, movement, constant movement, basically a taste of heaven. I don't know how to articulate what I feel here in the Big Apple. I just stood in Time Square for over an hour watching all the faces stream by, wondering at their existence, imagining how beautiful their stories must be...Why is she smiling?...What makes them looking into each other's eyes like that?...Why is that blond gal looking so sad and standing in the middle of so many just to be alone?...What brought him to the place where he hands out fliers to a strip club?
This city is devastating. I couldn't deal with this place for an extended period, there are just too many stories, too many lives to constantly wonder about. I am too curious for this city. I can't be like the wall of people who don't so much as turn to look when a man screams in agony after being clipped by a cab or at the screaming prostitute led away by New York's finest.
I am glad I leave tomorrow. I love this city, its the greatest in the world, but I can't handle it. Maybe I'm just too small for it.
Seeing the acid-worn statuary in Washington Park made me think about my time in St. Augustine Florida, so let's step back.
I got to Augustine at about 11pm after a slow drive up from the Miami Area. Parking was easy in old town and I (being an obsessive walker) headed in search of adventure before the engine had stopped settle into stasis. I walked through the Plaza de la Constitucion into the old retail district:

Then I saw the oldest wooden school house in N. America:

I ease-dropped on a ghost tour discussing the city wall watchman's daughter who is said still stand at the wall and wave at drunk people. Here is her wall:

After that I started looking for some coffee, failed, started getting cold and thought about going back to the car and abandoning my quest for the castle. I'm glad I didn't. Instead of getting warm I drove on quickening my pace to stay warm. I found the famous Castillo de san Marcos. It was closed (obvious I know by then it was 11:50pm). However I felt that I had a moral obligation to breach the wall being a loyal subject of her majesty the Queen of England. Oh yeah! Didn't I mention it? I am a dual citizen of both the United Kingdom and the United States. Wierd huh? Email/call me and I'll explain if your interested in another piece of my story. Anyways, when the Spanish held this historic fortress the British tried several times to take it. They were repelled each time. The Fortress is imposing to be sure, but couldn't the British ships blast a hole in the wall and storm the castle? Well no. One reason is that the fortress is built from Cantila (a locally hewn sedimentary rock that is very porous). When a cannon ball strikes this it doesn't crack/shatter the bulwark, rather the ball is "absorbed" into the wall. It just gets stuck inside of the stone. So this fort was never defeated in battle.
I am British. So I mounted a night-time assault. It helped that I was dressed entirely in black (I can't help that it is my most flattering color). So I snuck past a young star-gazing couple and a bored looking guard and into the grounds of the National Monument. I jumped down into the fort's moat, this is what I saw:



The lack of light made any longer range photos a study in black shadow.
I ran into an official ghost tour of the fort and I blended into the group. That's when I saw this cannonball furnace. What the defenders would do was heat a cannon ball until it glowed red and then drop it into a cannon and shoot it into a ship starting a fire:

Oh and this store's sign reminded me of Phil's upcoming clothing line:

One final anecdote. As i walked back to the car around 2am I approached a ghost tour from a dark alley. One of the tour participants looked down the alley and violently grabbed his buddy and pointed at me. I stopped and stared the wide-eyed men down...What was the big deal? They eventually moved on whispering to each other. This was my wardrobe for the evening:

Was I really that "ghost like"?
Next time I'll tell you about a church that made Mars Hill look like a preschool...

Florida's Eastern Coast

Miles: 9624.3
Gallons Burned: 316.8 (total gas mileage is 30.377 so far)
Caffeinated Drinks: 59
Gigabytes of Pictures: 26.8

I'm sitting in Scoop Beauregard's Ice Cream and Coffee Shop. Enjoying a nice Latte. Contemplating a book. Yep life is good. Here in Falls Church the weather is cloudy and there are piles of snow everywhere...It's almost like there was a big storm here or something.
I just had this little blond-haired kid come up to me and say "Excuse me mister. But your computer is really cool my uncle has one just like it." All in one breath, then he turned away before I could even say thanks. Man, I clearly remember being that awkward yet bold and honest all at the same time. It was like a week ago! He just wanted to tell me exactly what he thought and that's all. Why do I feel self conscious and so often don't say what I think with boldness like that kid did? We should be more like that kid.
The odd and fantastic people I have run into on this trip have helped me to see why is is so stupid to live as I do: Self absorbed. From those kind folks at St. George's, the great young guy from the Alabama fireworks store, the kid from Wolf Mountain, the snow bird down in the Keys, the friends from school that I have seen, a fellow blogger from Bowling Green, the wonderful couples in San Antonio and Dunedin, all the people that have been there and been harsh or encouraging, the nice and cruel, the needy and the generous, all of you have been agents showing me how small my perspective has been. So thank you. So much.
Now that I have "introspected" a little how about we talk about what happened after my adventure in the Keys.
I slept that night at a rest stop on the Ronald Reagan/Florida's Turnpike. The next day I drove up the east coast of Florida on FL-1 and FL-A1A. I pulled off A1A at Patrick Air Force Base's Beach. There was an amazing beach with no wind and 8 foot waves that dozens of surfers were enjoying. Since this coast is open cold ocean, they were wearing wet suits. I'd love to learn to surf, maybe some day I'll head out to the Washington coast and give it a shot.

I made it to Cape Canaveral about 4pm and drove out to the Kennedy Space Center.



I bet you think I went into the visitor center...Well...No. It was late in the day and it cost $38. But I took pictures of the outside of the center!
On the way out I notice this place:

I guess NASA has its own nuclear reactor across the inter-coastal waterway.
I continued north to New Smyrna Beach and enjoyed seeing the cars out driving on the sand.

Next time St. Augustine and my night time shenanigans at Castillo de San Marcos...

Dunedin Flor and Chess' Core

Miles: 6460.2
Gallons Burned: 221.4
Caffeinated Drinks: 36

I am sitting in George and Catie's (Alicia's parents, thanks so much to the three of you) living room at about 11:30pm while I listen to The Mountain goats (Thanks Joe!). Dunedin Florida (pronounced "done-eden", huh reminds me of Seqium, WA which of course is pronounced "squim") is a neat city outside of the Tampa Bay Metro-plex. George took me on a great evening tour of the city and allowed me a glimpse into his illustrious chess career.
Here we go again...another Aside! Are you serious?!
George has beaten Masters and even a handful of Grandmasters! He has played in the Canadian Open and many regional and national US tournaments. George's highest rating was 2250 USCF. He has a second edition Nimzowitsch's "My System" and a book published in 1848 that has games recorded with white starting first as well as games with black starting first! He has a beautiful ivory whale bone chess set that is all hand-made and might cost as much as $200-$400 per piece to replace!
So...why do I care so much about finding someone who is passionate about those 64 squares and 32 pieces? Glad you asked! My dad loves the game, and he imparted his love to me. I played in my first rated chess tournament when I was four-and-a-half years old and won 3 games out of 5 (I think, is that right Dad?). Over the next 14 years I played more than 480 rated tournament games, more than any other player in Washington State scholastic history (there is one seventh grader who is on pace to play 510 if he sticks with it as long as I did). With my dad's help, I traveled to Canada and 13 states (and DC if that one counts for anything) to play in all kinds of events ranging from an international match to the US Open.
I guess I am sort of bragging...oh wait...no. I'm a chess player. We are a peculiar folk, not mainstream, so there is not much to brag about.
When you would have been playing PeeWee football or staying after school to work on a play, I would sit alone memorizing famous games and endgame tactics or hidden in a little room with a couple of other not-so-cool kids practicing opening strategy.
My dad shelled out a lot of cash on lessons from an International Master and on plane tickets. I won a couple of state championships and some national honors. But why Chess? All those hours, days, months, dollars...
The game is ancient and has been played from India to Iceland in people's basements and in Cold War international matches between superpowers. It is kinda "the" game. For those who are new to the topic of Chess, it is an exercise in spatial pattern recognition blended into a psychological interrogation of your opponent wrapped neatly in 64 squares with the brutal soundtrack of a ticking binary clock.
I have made people cry in frustration and defeat. I have been offered bribes to throw games. I have seen and executed checkmates 12 moves into the future. I have broken down others and been broken.
To answer the why question, I need to have another Aside. (Seriously can you actually have an Aside within an Aside? A digression to a digression?)
I was home schooled (No not like that...well sort of). My mom and dad didn't want me (the tiny Josh, lowest 2 percent of elementary boys in height) in school. Problem was they weren't teachers. They did their best, but what it came down to was me and a bunch of books. I taught myself math, history, science, and cursive writing. I didn't always do a good job (just look at my cursive writing, I sort of made up my own letter style which is not correct by anyone's standard, I still use them today).
So my mind was formed into a almost totally analytical computer. I looked at everything in terms of protocols and decision trees stretching into the future...even people. That makes me a horrible person in many ways, but ideally suited to Chess. I am still trying to add the whole empathic, artistic, and "fuzzy" sides to my character (hence the road trip and forcing myself to write this journal, but I still get to use Excel so I am in in my emotional happy place).
To summarize why I love chess:
I enjoy chess because I wired my brain to love systems and incremental analysis, both of the board and my opponent's mind, and because it allowed me to have an identity as a kid and adolescent.
When I went into a chess slump, I felt terrible and my identity as a chess players (and as a person) was rocked.
Don't tie your identity to something transient like I did. It sucks.
Basically, it was a treat to meet someone like George who shares an obscure passion and interest.
Tomorrow, February 9th, I'll be heading south to see Fort DeSoto, the Sunshine Skyway, Myakka State Park, and the Everglades.

Louisiana Bayous

Miles:5425.9
Gallons Burned: 185.82
Caffeinated Drinks: 34

I'm sitting half a mile pass an oil refinery on a two lane road frequented by hunters with shotguns and fishers with graphite rods. As the engine idles, powering this netbook, I look out at egrets, pelicans, and dozens of other unidentifiable birds. It's overcast and the trees sit out in the bayous looking like the masts of sunken galleons that have been locked in ice.

I can smell my steak searing on the stove under cover of bacon, and "I think to myself what a wonderful world". Um actually...I just had that great song pop into my head.
In truth, what I have been thinking about all day is a family's feeling of loss when they came back to see their house destroyed by the storm surge. The entrepreneur who put 30 years into his hardware store, building it piece by piece and defeating all opponents, only to have it scattered and laid waste by hundred-mile-an-hour winds. Even after 4 years the wounds in this community are blatantly evident. Whole neighborhood's with no one but rats for tenants. Wrecked shrimp boats dragged unceremoniously from highways and left to rot in the ditches. Behind each rotting house, car, business, and boat was a man's dream, a goal, possibly a life's pursuit. All gone, all "meaningless."


This volunteer fire department still uses their old partially collapsed building.
When I use the word "meaningless", I use it as Solomon used it. Meaningless is used over 30 times in his book Ecclesiastes and is selected to show how finite and how brief life, achievements, and pursuits really are. Perhaps "vapor" is a better term. The dude actually opens his book with: "Meaningless, meaningless all is meaningless." His publisher must have been an imbecile. You don't start like that! Who would want to read past that?
Well...I guess I am rather undiscriminating. Anyway, he lived it up: master of wealth, master of sex, master of political power, master of a nation, and master of reputation. His freaking house was way bigger and more elaborate than the one they built to God. He had a posse and a harem. And then he has the gall to write this book at the end of his life and say, "Meaningless, meaningless, all is meaningless." (He does eventually close the book with an answer to life's meaninglessness, you can read it for yourself if you want.)
I haven't lived very long; I haven't seen the deepest horrors of this world. Looking at the devastation here in the Ninth Ward and the Mississippi River delta, I think he's right. Life is a vapor, before I know it I'll be dead and all my achievements and pursuits (even my name and any memory that I even existed) will all be forgotten.
So now that you are all sad and (now a quick quote from one of the funniest guys I have ever met) "have a bottle of Wild Turkey in one hand and a gun in the other, wondering if you should end it all right here", what do you do?
Solomon answer: "nothing is better for you than to eat and drink and enjoy the good of your labor."
So I come back to where I started. Steak! Wow I love steak. It's so tasty and good, the rare/medium rare tender goodness just calls out to me. I wish I weren't driving back to New Orleans after this otherwise, I would totally pop open a bottle of Washington state cabernet and enjoy a glass with my steak. Eat my friends, drink too, enjoy your life because you don't have long to live.

Avery Island's Jungle and Tobasco's Lore

Miles: 5518.0
Gallons Burned: 188.6
Caffeinated Drinks: 35

Sorry for the lack of chronological order in my posts. This post was composed during my diner at Pere Antoine's.
The morning after my revelation on sleep, I drove south to the world famous Tabasco Factory on Avery Island. A family by the name of McIlhenny settled here in the early 1800s and a genius created Tabasco Sauce. I really don't care for the "hot" sauce, but I was fascinated by the tour and fulfilled one of my trip's quests: Buy a gallon of Tabasco. I actually bought 2 one-gallon containers (increasing my danger in the event of a collision - "it burns, it burns!!").

As interesting as this red blooded piece of Americana was the Avery Island's Jungle Gardens was more so.
Okay, Okay. I know the constant "Asides" are getting annoying (but no more annoying than my excessive use of parentheses (it not annoying(okay maybe it is))), so how about one more, aside that is.
I am a visual dude. I love architecture, lighting, still photography when done well, and video. I love the visual arts so much that I spent all three years of my undergraduate education working for a division II football team as their video guy. I also worked for the college's video productions department. Then when I went to grad school up at Washington, I kept at it. I did 3 more seasons of football with the Huskies sports video crew and enjoyed every minute.
Here's the view from one of my locations during practice.

Clip from the USC game up in Seattle. This is where I am during games. I use a full size DVC Pro Panasonic to shoot play-by-play game action.

This picture has always stood with me. The framing is not the best, the white balance is a little hot, their is no specific point of attention, but I really love it. For me this is the breath before the plunge and a great memory. I am the shadow in the foreground.

End Aside.
Now that you know a little more about me you'll understand what a visual treat the Jungle Gardens of Avery Island were to me.
One of Tobasco's creator's sons was a naturalist who created an egret sanctuary. An egret is a big white bird that was endangered or something. The point is that there is a 250 acre Chinese-Japanese-Plantation garden in the middle of the bayous, pepper fields, and salt mines. Seriously, a genuine Asian oasis in the swamps of Louisiana.


A Blue Heron:


A little bit of Tim Burton in this spade or heart-shaped vine:

Remember the famous bamboo forests from Crouching tiger Hidden Dragon?


Reflection shots are cliche, but still cool.

There be gators about! I still have never seen one, they don't move around on cold days.


Gator tracks:

Later I'll post a New Movie Maker Project inspired by the Jungle Gardens.

Tales of California's North Coast

Miles: 2331.9
Gallons Burned: ~80
Caffeinated Drinks: 18

Right now I am sitting in my car in Joshua Tree National Park...in Snow. That's right this place boasts 350 days each year of sun. So of course I came during the 1 day each decade it snows!!!?! Seriously, I'm having a blast. I am enjoying J.R.R. Tolkien's Silmarillion audio book (thanks Mora & Eric), so I apologize in advance if some Chaucer-esque verbiage escapes into my posts. The original plan called for me to be at the Grand Canyon today, but due to three winter storms that have dumped nearly 2 feet of snow there, I detoured South to experience the flooded and frozen deep desert.

As I sit in the ice and snow powering my netbook via a power inverter, how about I tell you the story of my time in San Francisco:




I took public transportation to ford the 65 miles betwixt SJ and SF.

The City's skyline from the Oakland Bridge Westward.

I really like this bridge. It beats the Golden Gate hands down.

I walked the entire waterfront from baseball great Mays' statue at Giants' Park to the Presidio. Then up the hills to Lombard Street:


This Windows Movie Maker video is a compilation of 58 still photos taken from the top of the world's crooked street to the base. It is my first attempt at a Movie Maker project, so feel free to leave feedback.

Gear for the Road

This a list of the gear I'll be taking. Does anyone have any suggestions for additions/subtractions from my gunna [Late Latin "gunna", leather traveling garment, term for all one's worldly goods]?

Net book computer
GPS unit: Magellan Maestro
Power Inverter (1200 Watt 12 Volt DC to 110 Volt AC)
DC in-car refrigeration unit
Propane cook stove
2 man tent
12 emergency rations (Military MREs)
Costco of hand warmers
ThermaCare Heat Wraps
-25F bedroll
Cameras
Books

My Blog's Purpose

I'm Taking a 12,000 mile road trip across the United States....in January.
Now for no reason at all a random poem:

Leavin' from Seattle's Emerald green,
Drivin' coast's curves to Diego's shore.
Questin' from warmth of West to heat of East,
Crusin' Florida's Keys,
Jinglin' beaches Northbound thru' Capital and Appletal.
Rollin' into tundra's crown, so Maine,
Feelin' the brutal wind of Cago-town,
Endurin' the dark towering Rockies so cold.
Back to my wet town of olde.

Don't know where that came from.
Anyway, I'm leaving Seattle on January 4th, do the loop, and be back to Seattle late in February.
This blog will be the best place to keep tabs on me as I progress. My best pictures will be posted here. Almost-daily updates will be made as WiFi opportunities emerge.
Also Facebook is the place I'll be posting all the pictures.

Check out my links to see the trip's map.

Keep checking back...