Last weekend I was invited to play shepherd # 3 in our church Christmas musical and I’d like to introduce you to a new segment entitled ‘Reflections from Shepherd # 3.”  The performance received some good reviews. It was pretty awesome. I didn’t have a staff at first to carry and I immediately rectified that situation by finding a stick that was quite a bit shorter than the other two shepherds and was partially broken. It was no surprise that it snapped further while I was sitting on the stage. I put part of my broken staff in one of the decoration plants in the lobby because I was focussing on my next scene. Me and Shepherd # 2 were making bets on how long that would stay there for. It’s probably still there. I’ll check tomorrow.

A few people were quoted after saying “Way to go, you didn’t mess any of your lines up.” and “I thought you had lines” and yet another person said “good job sitting.”  I kept saying “I felt good about that one” and “Photos in the lobby with Shepherd # 3″ I can’t quite remember what Ashlee-Heather said after but I’m sure she was speechless from the performance. I was trying to get an interpretive dance  written in but it wasn’t quite fitting into the musical. Next year hopefully. One of the highlights for me was seeing a couple youth in the hallway while I was waiting for my big scene and chasing after them saying “is that a stray sheep!” I like to stay in character. I remember asking one of them if I could put him over my shoulders for the next scene and he be a sheep.

The other day I texted the pastor in charge of the musical during our staff meeting and said “Hey, it’s Shepherd # 3″ He was sitting across the table from me leading the meeting. He looked at his phone with a confused look and said “What?”  Gotta keep ‘em guessing.

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In other news, Ashlee-Heather and I watched ‘Home Alone’ the other day on T.V. I think Home Alone is probably my fav Christmas movie. I used to like the Santa Clause featuring Tim the toolman taylor. Ashlee-Heather and I text lines to each other from Home Alone. That’s how we roll.

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And finally, Christmas season has returned. I’d like to leave you with a piece of advice about Christmas shopping that one of my friends told me when we were shopping one time for church. “Shopping is crazy during Christmas..get your elbows up!” Good night Canada, America I’ll be seeing you soon.

I found this video on my computer from a few years ago when me and my good friend talked about starting our own Church talk show called the Pew. It’s coming soon. Get your popcorn ready. We are going to sit on a pew and interview people. Let me know if you want to be the first guest. Right now it’s between Shane Claiborne, Bill Hybels, my cat Ardy, and our other friend Dean. To make it extra interesting we are also planning on filming on location at different church buildings that have pews. That might mean our guests are more likely to be security guards and church administrators trying to get us out of the building than Bill Hybels. I’ll keep you posted.

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I’d like to introduce a new segment entitled ‘The Book of Awkward Volume 1.’ I once tweeted that I was going to write a book called the Book of Awkward that would be like the Book of Awesome but just about Awkward things rather than Awesome things. If you ask me being awkward and being awesome go hand in hand.  So here is the first volume. Enjoy. Awkward night 2011 coming soon to youth groups everywhere.

Waving to someone who’s waving to someone behind you.
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This happened to me in High School and it was wicked (I think it’s time to bring that word back) awkward. This girl was waving to me in the hallway and I said to myself “hmm I don’t think we really know each other but she’s waving to me and looks excited.” So I waved back with a head nod. Meanwhile the other person she was waving at was behind me. To make matters even more awkward the girl that was waving had to tell me she was talking to the person behind me. AWKWARD.

Someone calling you by the wrong name
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This gets awkward because someone might call you by the wrong name so many times in a conversation that correcting them would be even more awkward. For the record, Ashlee-Heather gets this all the time. One time someone called her Angela. Another time Mandy. And yet another time it was Arlene. I sometimes call her Rhonda. One time I think it was during a prayer circle that someone was praying for Ashlee-Heather and called her a different name. At which point I opened my eyes and looked over at A-Heather. I’m glad she didn’t see me because we both probably would have start cracking up right then and there during the prayer circle. That would have been AWKWARD.

A joke that doesn’t work
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Crickets. AWKWARD.

Hearing your own voice recorded
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I get this one a lot because I like to leave messages on the answering machine at home when I know Ashlee-Heather is home but not answering. So I’ll leave a professional sounding message. “Hi, this message is for Ashlee-Heather Mackneer this is Jim calling from the insurance company…” I don’t know if this is actually awkward but those of you who’ve heard your own voice recorded you know it’s something. Awkward maybe not but it’s close. It also depends what you’ve recorded and who’s listening. It could be AWKWARD. When I was younger I used to call home and play my Cornet in the answering machine to the tune of Let’s Go Band. That was more awesome than awkward.

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Good night Canada, Stay awkward America.