I wasn't exactly planning on burying a dead dog in my yard last night. I should clarify, that this was not one of my dogs, but a dog I have never met before.

We had just finished up hanging out at my in-laws house for a birthday dinner; Allison's grandpa Ralph was the guest of honor. Driving in separate cars, Allison headed for home with Ava and I was on my way to the grocery to pick up some last minute items for my trip to Atlanta.

Before I got to the store, Allison called me with a frantic "There's a dog in the road that got hit and it's still moving...I don't know what to do!"

I didn't know either, but I told her "I'll be right there."

When I pulled up to the bloody and squirming dog my heart sank. These are the situations when I realize just how much of a sucker for animals I really am. I put the car in park and switched on the flashers. This dog was in really bad shape. It was a black and white, male Shetland Sheepdog.

He was still moving when I got down on the road by him. Not a whole lot...but breathing and moving his legs about. I wasn't sure what to do so I looked for a collar on him...there was a small collar, but no tags.

I moved him off to the side of the road into the grass and I prayed that he would be okay. When I felt the back of his head I could tell he wasn't going to be. His skull was partially crushed. I've got to be honest that my prayer did not end with an amen, but rather, a dammit.

Not exactly sure what I should do next, I went to two of the houses that were nearby. Ringing doorbells, explaining what was going on, residents didn't know anything about this dog.

I thought about leaving him on the side of the road for a split second and I knew it wasn't right. I thought about calling someone, but no one could fix this. So I decided to load up the dying dog into my vehicle and drive him to the local animal hospital. He was covered in blood, so I laid out the only paper I had on the floor of the car...it was the 7 pages of notes I had from my teachings at church this past weekend.

The nameless dog stopped moving just as I pulled into the animal hospital parking lot. I had him sitting right next to me and I wasn't sure if I should even go in at this point. He was dead.

As I thought about it, I remembered that some dogs have microchips put into their skin in case they ever get lost. If he had one, at least we could let the owner know. I'm certain they were looking for this little guy. I also just didn't know what to do next...so I went in.

They rushed out like an ER team for humans and carted the dog into the hospital. They immediately checked all his vitals and determined what I had already known...he was gone. They took down my information, checked him for a microchip...which he didn't have, and gathered a description of him in case anyone called looking.

They told me that as much as they hated doing it, they had to charge me if I were to leave the dog there for them to dispose of. The other option was me taking him with me and figuring something out. I buried the unknown dog right where I would have buried either of my own dogs; a place of honor on my property.

I know it may sound stupid, but I really hope that little dog caught a glimpse of a human taking care of him as best he could before giving up. And may his owners have peace after losing a friend.

They're calling the nearly rainless storm we had on Sunday a Class 1 hurricane. This is Cincinnati, Ohio. We don't have hurricanes. We don't know what to do in these situations. But, we made the most of it. Here are some pics of the happenings.

At first it was just windy out:


Then debris started falling:


Things started getting tossed around:


That's when I started hearing the snaps:


Here's my neighbor's tree on my driveway:


80mph winds are able to uproot even the healthy trees:




Huge trees down on both sides of the street:


This little baby missed some cars by about 2 feet:




Zoinks.




The cool thing was how it brought so many in the community together:


The other cool thing is that I'm getting some serious use out of my chainsaw:




Although the house is messy, it still looks cool all lit up with candles. I'm glad our electricity is back on, but there's something special seeing so many kids outside playing on a day where there is no TV, no video games, no computer. If it weren't for the tragedies involved, I'd probably say I enjoyed this last few days. We're some of the fortunate who have had power restored to us. There are still around 500,000 throughout the greater Cincinnati area without power.



This may have been a once in a lifetime situation to be involved in. The remnants of Hurricane Ike and a cold front came together in such a way that we were hit harder than any time in Duke Energy's history for this area. Pretty crazy stuff.

While I'd love to give you an update from our camping trip...more insane events have been in the works around the Cincinnati area. We've had massive trees falling all around us due to winds in excess of 60+ mph! My entire street is wrecked. Tomorrow should be a fun day of clean up.

Our electricity is out as well as around 700,000 others in Cincy. Please pray for us as they're saying it could be 2-3 days before we recieve our power back. Fires have been breaking out and I just heard that three people have been confirmed dead due to falling trees.

I'll give you an update when I can...hugs and kisses.

Post Script: Here's the thought of the day - You can really tell what kind of parent you are when you have a 2 year old and no electricity. I'm just saying...

Before I say anything else, I need to establish the fact that my friend Todd is insane. Crazy. Loco. Wacko. Bonkers. We're talking not of sound mind okay?

Here he is with his baby girl Rebekah:



Stark. Raving. Mad.



We're talking about a guy who once owned a 12ft. Reticulated Python...in a dorm room...a dorm room that caught fire...and Todd went in and saved the snake.

We're talking about a guy who picks up 15-20 kids off the streets every week to bring them to church...a guy who just bought a limo for said purpose.

We're talking about a guy who once wrestled an actual brown bear in a shady contest rigged in the bear's favor...a guy who was beat badly by said bear.

We're talking about a guy who had a ginormous custom balloon made up for his graduation from Ohio State:



We're talking about a guy who just ran a 650ft. Zip line from a tree, over a lake, to another tree...just for kicks.

We're talking about a guy who happens to own a large African Serval Cat that walks around his house and makes me poop my pants every time I see it.


Serval photo by Stefan on Flickr

Yeah...that guy.





Well...Mr. Crazy African Cat owner has run into a bit of an ordeal recently. I got a panicked call yesterday afternoon saying that the cat has escaped. Todd was getting ready to head out of town and another friend of mine, Eric, agreed to keep the Serval while he was away.

Some time during the transfer process, the cat busted out of it's box and escaped into a rural town. Yes...I'm serious. We spent a good bit of the day searching for Gideon to no avail. Todd is freaking out a good bit right now as this cat isn't your ordinary house pet. If someone runs across Gideon, they're likey to assume it's some sort of Cheetah that wants to kill them and they may shoot him or worse.


Serval photo by Picture Taker 2 on Flickr

Todd has printed up fliers and is offering a reward for Gideon, but honestly I'm not sure how anyone will catch him. He's nearly 50lbs of pure muscle, built for hiding, and he can jump 15ft. straight up in the air. I know while I was out in the woods looking for him, my basic plan of action was to locate him (?) and then throw a blanket over him (yeah right).



We're just waiting for this to show up on the news. Please pray that we find this cat before anyone or anything gets hurt. Oh yeah...this cat cost well over $3,000 too. Zoinks.


Serval photo by golden shovel on Flickr

This past weekend was a powerful one. Vineyard Westside held an annual outdoor baptism service as we have done for the past 3 years now. We typically meet inside the movie theater, but for this service, we call everyone together all at once and meet outside in the parking lot.

We set up tents and chairs and expect that hundreds of people will show up. And they do. Five hundred or so show up hungry for hamburgers and hotdogs, drinks and sides, but most importantly they show up hungry for God.

Our worship team cranks everything up a few notches and they play until their fingers are numb.







They rock out a few songs and get everyone excited to be there.



At this point, Jim, our children's pastor comes up to do baby dedications. This is an opportunity to have parents and their kids prayed over to devote themselves to a life of following God.



And now it's time for the waterworks. Emotions quickly begin flying all over the place as people line up to get into a horse trough. We don't have a fancy baptismal or anything like that. We've got a 300 gallon Rubbermaid container...and it's holy. It's holy because people step into it who are announcing to the world that they're willing to die to themselves to be raised to life in Christ.

Music continues to play as friends and family join around loved ones for prayer and support.



And then it happens. People surrender themselves and become so vulnerable that everyone can see it. And we have baptism. My sister goes first. Those of you who know me personally are aware of the insane crap that's gone down with Amie...here's to a step in the right direction.







One after another, people line up and get ready for the big splash.







I even got the opportunity to baptize people who are very close to me.

This is my father-in-law Ted. He wrote a letter that stated he doesn't want to do it all on his own anymore.



Ryan and Carrie, our beloved house mates were baptized.



My friend Jon baptized his son Jonah.





My wife's sister Andrea came out of the crowd as she was overwhelmed by the Spirit...she just had to do it. Her husband Chris was given the honor.



Lo and behold my beautiful bride Allison made the decision to be baptized as well. She was baptized as a baby and she wanted this one to be up to her.





I'm still reeling from everything that happened yesterday. It was all a bit surreal. I took about 400 pictures and this is less than 20 of them. At least 35 people were baptized yesterday and some serious damage was done to the kingdom of darkness.

Praise be to Jesus.

For as long as I can remember the Japanese Maple has been my favorite tree. Mind you, I didn't always know what that bright red, Bonsai-looking tree was called, but it's always been my favorite.

About 3 years ago I set out to purchase a Red Dragon Japanese Maple. Turns out...they're expensive as snot. And so I waited, and waited, and coveted, and waited until a good deal found me. I picked up a beautiful medium-sized [maybe 3 ft. tall] Red Dragon for about $65. This was a steal considering all the nurseries around here wanted upwards of $250 for the same tree.

That would have been the happy ending to my fairytale love affair with the Acer Palmatum...it's not a happy ending though. My tree has been ravaged. I'm not talking about a branch or two. I mean this thing has been decimated.

Here's what I woke up to this morning:


My poor little Maple tree has been murdered. Not only has it been broken in half by some beastly creature, it's limbs have been pulled apart.



I would typically blame the dogs for something like this, as they have done their fair share of ruining my plants and flowers, but this was too big a job for either of them. This took some serious force. Even Harlan, who is approx. 45 lbs running around the house full speed wouldn't have done this at a full collision.



I've got two theories as to what could have happened. Wanna hear them? Okay good.

Theory #1 - Some Church-Goer who didn't appreciate my recent message on Community and Building Relationships took out their anger on my little red buddy. This is possible...although not probable. If it were me, I would have slit my tires.

Theory #2 - The Garden did it.

Allow me to explain theory #2. We have a garden at our house.

See figure A.:


The above, said garden is doing quite well...which is exactly why I think it victimized my tree. Not enough evidence? Allow me to continue!

Our garden is filled with hair. Carrie cuts hair on the side and each and every individual who gets a trim around here ends up in our garden...well, at least their hair does. You see, our garden is completely Organic. Rather than spray something on our garden to keep the Deer away, we have opted for more natural methods. Enter hair.



Now I'll be darned if it doesn't work and work well. We don't have any problems with Deer eating our stuff. Hair has been proven to keep them away...it really works!

Check out figures B., C., and D. for more evidence:

The proof is in the pudding...or in this case, it's in the vegetables. The deer aren't able to have their way with our tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, squash, beans, corn, etc.., and they're pee-ohed.

As retribution, Bambi's brother Rocco has taken the life of someone close to me. If you've ever seen what a deer can do to a tree with it's antlers, you'd agree with me that the marks are very similar. I have no clue why a male deer would want to come up to the smallest tree in my yard and completely molest it, but I'm not a deer and so I'm unable to answer that question.

All I know is that Little Red will be missed.