Buffalo Hunt

Good friend and long-time hunting partner, Tom Johnson, recently invited me on a buffalo hunt in southwest Colorado close to the "pinto bean capital of the world". I hesitated to go at first because we haven't exactly had the best fortune the past couple years whether it be turkey hunting, coyote hunting, or deer hunting. In fact, we have been shutout. We always have a blast, though, so I gave another kind of hunt with Tom another try. This time it was a success. We braved three feet deep snow in our snowshoes, and managed to locate a couple of bulls in a maze of pinon and junipers. Tom made a great shot through the brush to kill a bull that was on the run. Then the real work began, but we had a lot of good help as you can see below. It may not have been an old-fashion buffalo hunt in the order of how the Lakota and Cheyenne used to do it on the great plains, but we still had some good old-fashion fun.

We arrive at the hunting grounds on our giant iron steed. Rocky, Tom, and Kent are fired up.




TATANKA!













THERE!














You can never be too cautious when approaching a mortally wounded 1500 lb. animal.












Trophy Shot







Get in there deep!











Is that Jeremiah Johnson???








The great white hunter packs several hundred pounds of meat onto his trusty steed then heads back to his village where tales of his hunting prowess will be told and retold for years to come.

Schizo

Let's face it, Mark Twain hit the nail on the head when he said, "The trouble with common sense is it ain't too common." Our current political scene does not make sense. It is schizo. The Republicans and conservatives are inconsistent, as are the Democrats and liberals. I don't even know what those terms stand for anymore. I tried to express this recently in an email to a good friend of mine who has the intelligence to come up with good answers. Here is an excerpt:

...Most confusing to me are the terms conservative and liberal. I research much on cnn, fox, msnbc. etc. I have also been listening to the different talk shows such as the absurd Limbaugh, the boring Hannity, and the entertaining Savage. None of it is consistent or adds up.

During the 2000 and 2004 elections all conservatives talked about were pro-life and marriage. Now that is nowhere to be found. Instead, they tear apart a Baptist preacher for raising taxes once upon a time in Arkansas or tear apart McCain for trying to get campaign spending under control. All the while the fact that the current president is the most liberal spending president in history is ignored. On the other side the Dems constantly espouse equality for all classes and races in the country but are likely to screw over a once in a lifetime candidate (IMO) by resorting to the rich and mighty superdelegates anointing a family that has shady ties all over the world. Back to the conservatives, and we have them being hateful toward people wanting to conserve the environment and can’t seem to put two and two together that our military has killed an average of 3000 civilians each month since the war on terror started, which isn’t exactly pro-life. Back to the liberals, and we have them talking a lot about socialized healthcare with no mention that this is already being done with veterans and Native Americans. You would think that they might point to these examples and talk about how it has worked and not worked. Back to the conservatives, and we see them having no problem with oil companies making record profits but having big problems with any talk about alleviating poverty in the world so that children might actually grow up to see the US in a good light and not want to terrorize us. Back to the liberals, and we see them talk about the plight of the blue-collar worker, yet they have no answers to illegal immigration and those blue-collar workers. Back to the other side, and we see them being staunchly against stem cell research because they say it destroys a living being (even though the science is getting beyond that), yet they fail to recognize that IUD’s and other forms of birth control abort millions more embryos than the relatively small number that are destroyed in stem cell research.

Neither side makes sense to me because it seems their main motives are to be divisive and vengeful. That is why a guy like me caught in the middle is drawn to Obama. I don’t know if I agree with everything about him. I don’t know if he can make good on his promises. I do know that he inspires and unites and is a breath of fresh air. His speeches are amazing...

After tonight's debate between Obama and Clinton, I am even more confident that Obama is the guy to bring some positives out of the mess Bush has created. He is an expert communicator, and I think he conveyed an intelligent stance on what to do about illegal immigration, as well as a number of other issues.

BONO-fied

Last week was a pretty tough week for us, but as they say "all is well that ends well."
Friday night, after an all day long medical school interview for me (which could be a whole other post), Tracy and I unwound and rocked out to my all-time favorite band and second favorite music act of all time after Rich Mullins (who deserves his own post and probably would cringe at being referred to as a "music act"). We got BONO-fied at the Imax theater to the music of U2. This is a first of its kind 3D film experience of the Irish band playing to huge soccer stadium crowds in South America. We wore the big silly glasses and felt like we were right there with the Argentinians, Brazilians, and the rest. We were clapping, raising our hands, and screaming while the rest of the Imax audience sat stoically and were probably wondering "who let the freaks in?" It was a blast. Music is very important to most humans, and when a band combines innovative music and meaningful lyrics, it can transcend most of the b.s. in life that tends to divide us. U2 does that, and I have always admired how they subtly mix in Kingdom messages with their surreal sound. I know that Bono is sometimes extravagant and over-the-top with things he says and does, but you've got to hand it to him. He is a great example of someone using their unique position in life to make a difference; a difference that thousands in the African AIDS crisis have felt.
Check it out:
www.U23DMovie.com

Just Read It

I know 2008 is still an infant, but I can't imagine reading another book this year that can top Three Cups of Tea. The style it is written in is not exceptional by any means, but the story...the story is one of the most stirring, riveting, and potentially life-changing ones I've read in a long time.
Greg Mortenson failed at climbing K2, which is the second highest mountain in the world and by most accounts the hardest to climb. A story about the baddest mountain on earth would be good in and of itself, but as one door closes the true story begins. Mortenson gets lost after descending K2 and wanders into a village not on any maps. The people care for him and befriend him. He vows to return and repay them by building a much needed school. For the next year he struggles as an ER nurse and failed climber to raise money for some no-name village in Pakistan, a village of Muslims. Since Sir Edmund Hillary's conquest of Everest in 1953, the climbing community has reached out to the villages of the Tibetan area, villages of Buddhists, but nobody had ever tried to help the villages of the western Himalaya. Through a lot of dead-ends, tea-drinking, and perseverance Mortenson gets the school built. Over the next decade he is instrumental in building over 50 schools in Pakistan and forming friendships with high ranking Muslim officials as well as the common villager. As the Taliban took control of Afghanistan and Muslim Jihadists threatened his work by constructing madrassas and proclaiming fatwas on him, Mortenson kept focused on his proactive work. He knew that educating the children, especially the girls, was the key to peace in that part of the world. After 9/11 things got really hot and interesting for him, but he did not give up or abandon Pakistan or Afghanistan. Today there are over 15,000 young adults and children who can thank Mortenson for his hard work, generosity, and self-sacrificial spirit that enabled them to get the education they needed.

This book reminds us that: being proactive is better than being reactive; all humans are created in the image of God; no Muslims are born as extreme militants; you don't have to be rich to make a difference; when you fight fire with fire, everyone gets burned; don't wait around on the government or legislation to change things; when you throw mud at a group that is different than you, you lose a lot of ground; education and relationships can lead to understanding and peace; good things happen when we get out of our comfort zones and aren't consumed with ourselves.

Read it. I don't know what Greg Mortenson's personal beliefs are. I really don't care. He is doing more in the war on terrorism than any bomb ever could.

http://www.threecupsoftea.com/

Super and not-so-super Thoughts

For the first time in my voting life I was excited to go vote. My first voting experience was in '96 for Dole vs. Clinton. I don't remember too much about it besides I was able to vote. In 2000, deep down I wanted to vote for Gore but the popular current around me persuaded me otherwise. Back then I could be persuaded with questions like, "But who would you rather have a beer with?" In 2004...it was like the pick your poison scene out of "The Princess Bride" movie only not as funny. Yesterday, Super Tuesday, I was finally excited to vote. We arrived at the Tsaile/Wheatfields Chapter House at 6:15. We were the first voters there. The workers looked at us like we were nuts and told us the polls didn't open until seven. We respectfully told them that all polling stations were open at 6:00 am across Super Tuesday America. One worker gave us a look like she'd been caught then told us to hang on for a couple minutes. When they were finally ready, we threw them a curve that broke right off the table by telling them we would have to vote provisionally because we just registered with the Democrat Party last week. The workers scurried around for about 15 minutes figuring out how to figure it out. When we did receive the ballots, the only hard part was finding Barack Obama's name amidst about 30 other names, most of which I'd never heard of. We placed our marked ballots into the box, received a "I voted" sticker, and then Tracy said for everyone to hear, "It's times like these that I am proud to be an American." I rolled my eyes but pretty much felt the same way. That evening we did some great cross-country skiing under the stars after we found our man had struck first with a win in Georgia. We were all smiles. Life was good. Then we came in from the -3 degrees weather with sore muscles and whining dogs to more wins by Obama but more confusion for us. I stayed up trying to decipher the results, and I slowly but surely found out that the Democrat Party is just as big a crock as the Republican Party. I watched as Obama rolled up more states but Hillary rolled up more delegates. I watched as Obama trounced her in Alabama only to be rewarded the same number of delegates as her. My education is all through the internet since we do not have TV, so I googled "What the hell is a superdelegate?" and found thousands had asked that same question. I watched online video clips on Fox and CNN of "experts" describing the allocation of delegates as a "complex formula". I realized that the Democratic Party has already anointed Hillary and they will scheme or fix it anyway they can with "complex formulas" to make sure her path is paved to the nomination. I guess it's politics as usual. At the end of the day neither Republicans nor Democrats want to change but rather keep the same old shady Washington ties going whether it is with the Bush family or Clinton family. That is why Obama is so refreshing to me. He doesn't just put the VCR tape in and push play to answer questions. He provides thoughtful and provocative answers. Take a look at this link as proof.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/januaryweb-only/104-32.0.html

It is sad that the election process has come to this. It could be so simple and pure. Whoever gets the most votes wins. Our country's democratic process is a cold, hard shell of itself.
It's another good reminder that everybody and everything is going to let us down except the one who created us and sustains us through his grace. The politicians are gong to let you down, the system is going to fail, the country is going to destruct, friends will forsake you, family will let you down and break your heart, and you will betray yourself, but He remains faithful and true. Who can we trust but the King of Kings? No one. So instead of getting excited to vote, maybe I should focus on getting excited to continually worship HIM!