Wedding Crashers

Due to popular response, I am following up on my Marriage Manners post with another one.

The question of the day: How polite is it to crash a wedding?

Granted, that question is somewhat leading since the term "crash" indicates the answer itself. Even so, are there certain situations in which it is more acceptable to attend a wedding uninvited? Here are some possible scenarios...

• Attending the ceremony vs. attending the dinner vs. attending the dance.
• Larger wedding with 100+ guests vs. only family and close friends.
• Public location vs. local church vs. private home.
• Catered affair vs. potluck dinner.

Some of the central concerns about wedding crashers include: the hosts had to pay for everything; limited and designated seating; invitations were sent months in advance; the bride and groom already went through the very difficult and socially awkward process of selecting their guest list. There's also a difference between not being able to have all of your friends and acquaintances attend versus explicitly not wanting someone to attend.

On the other side, two positive reasons to crash are: to bless and celebrate the couple; to have a fun evening for yourself; other friends are attending and you don't want to feel left out. Any other reasons that you can imagine? And does a nice card and gift mitigate the rudeness factor?

Does anybody care to relate some amusing stories on either side of this discussion? Have you been the crasher, or have you been the host?

Rollin' Eyeballs

Now the body is not made up of one part but of many. If the foot should say, "Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body," it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. And if the ear should say, "Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body," it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body.

The eye cannot say to the hand, "I don't need you!" And the head cannot say to the feet, "I don't need you!" On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it. 1 Corinthians 12:14-26

Every person that walks into church is a different part of the body of Christ. Some of us are eyes, some are hands, some are the head, some are the feet.

What happens if these body parts never work together as one body? What happens if the people never come together in relationships to support one another and move forward together?

It's like a single eyeball that rolls into church, watches the Sunday service, and then the eyeball rolls out of church again without ever touching another body part. It's like an ear that comes just to listen to the sermon, or lips that only showed up so they could sing, and then each part leaves on its own again.

Sure, each body part and each person might get something from the Sunday service but the experience is so limited. We need those other parts and those other people to really grow and to really accomplish something meaningful.

Greasy God

A lot of our churches are like fast food restaurants. We make it easy for someone to drive in, grab their greasy God meal and get out. We provide the spiritual food once a week, and it's optional to tip 10% to the server.

With a litle less rhetoric, I suggest that the average church makes it really easy for people to visit once a week for the Sunday sermon and worship. Say hi to a few people if you want to but feel free to slip in and out without notice. Since the Sunday service is the primary focus of most churches, and only a small number of people can be actively involved in it as ushers or musicians or whatever, the majority of the crowd must remain passive participants. We pick from a menu of services in different churches, select our order, eat up quickly and move on.

So for this passive majority, the way to get involved is outside of that Sunday service. Nursery care, youth ministry, soup kitchens, etc. These programs usually require some sort of regular time commitment and you will have less time for family and friends, naturally. And in many cases, the activity itself is the focus of your time, so you concentrate on keeping the kids entertained but don't actually get much of a chance to get to know the people you're with. The opportunities to get involved are still plentiful but they come at a price, like going to a restaurant where you wait for a half hour for your meal and the bill is more than twenty bucks each.

Churches make it really easy to simply attend a Sunday service and then it's a little harder to get involved with a ministry. And in the context of all of that, the hardest thing is to find ways to develop mentoring relationships and close friendships. It's still possible, of course, but I think that this is the most difficult thing to do inside of a church. So why are we surprised when the majority sticks with the easiest option?

To extend this metaphor even further, most people do not eat at fast food joints or fancy resturants on a regular basis. Instead, we prefer to do a little home cookin' with our own groceries most of the time. It's easier, it's cheaper and it's in the comfort of our own home. To compare that to our Christian lives, it's more like inviting a friend over for dinner to discuss God and life, and we get our spiritual nutrition that way. This method is both easy and effective, and most of us already do this anyway.

If we can agree that the one-on-one relationships are key to a healthy spiritual lives, then we need to make sure it's easy to do. If it's not easy to do then most people won't do it.

Marriage Manners

Exactly three months ago, I got engaged to my fiance Cam. There has been a flurry of activity ever since then, as can be expected. Notifying friends and family, two engagement parties, two sessions for engagement photos, deciding on the wedding party members, wedding dresses, location, rentals, catering...the list goes on.

Cam is amazingly well-organized. She sees the colours and ideas in her mind's eye so easily, so the design for the invitations and other things is going smoothly. It's been a lot of fun for both of us so far, though I have to give her the majority of the credit for her hard work.

All of this is a frequent topic when I speak to people, as everyone often asks about our plans and the final date and everything. Therein lies the rub. People don't seem to have any qualms about placing me in awkward situations during conversations. Allow me to point a few annoyances...

1. No, you may not invite yourself to the wedding ceremony, the wedding reception or the engagement parties.

2. If you are invited to the wedding or the engagement parties, then please don't ask someone else if they're invited to the wedding. Well, you can ask that question but don't ask it right in front of me! That forces me into the position of blatantly saying the person is not invited.

3. Don't assume you know who the Best Man is, or the Master of Ceremonies, or the Maid of Honour, or whatever. It may or may not be the person you are thinking of, and just throwing that question out in front of me can be a tad weird.

4. My fiance and I currently go to different churches. However, I made the mistake of answering someone's questions honestly, indicating that I would not want to be in a separate church from my own fiance forever. Lo and behold, two minutes later everyone knew that I was considering leaving my current church. Ouch!

(For the record, I am leaving my current church of Glad Tidings Assembly at the end of the Christmas season in order to join Northpark Community Church. And yes, I have informed my pastor about this already. I've been an active member for three and a half years so it will be somewhat sad to leave.)

Granted, some of these issues could have been resolved if I was more private about the planning. And I have had to speak to some casual friends to clearly ask them to back off a bit and not assume an invitation. I would find it all to be amusing if I wasn't so embarrassed by such situations.

And most of all, I think it's funny that I'm complaining about poor manners when in fact I tend to be oblivious to just how rude I can be sometimes. Irony noted.

Back To Square One

Professionally, this past year was quite a unique experience for me.

In December 2006, I let my company of eight years in order to help found a new company that was intended to help people with disabilities. While it was a great opportunity for me, the money never materialized and I ended up spending my savings during that period. That hurt financially and in retrospect it wasn't a prudent move but it was still a fascinating experience.

At various times during the year, I completed a couple of short-term programming contracts. Those were a ton of fun, and I enjoyed pulling together all of my varied skills to put on these little one-man shows. The trick is finding enough of these small projects, which ain't no small thing.

Back in August 2007, I joined another small company near London as a programmer. As it turns out, they needed someone to do technical support a lot more than they needed coding. Despite by best efforts, I got burned out from the constant phone calls and client care and I eventually had to resign from this job due to overwhelming stress. Today was my last official day with my current company, but they have a bright future ahead of them and I am disappointed that I had to leave.

I actually considered going back to my first company but my old position as Director no longer exists. I wouldn't enjoy returning if it meant kicking someone else out of a current management role, and I don't want to go back as a programmer only and lose the progress I've made in my career so far. That idea is somewhat awkward as well.

So here I am, back at square one. I would dearly love to find a job in people management for a software development team, or as a business analyst, or as a database architect. Overall, I wiped out my savings and ended up below the poverty line this year, which is hilarious. We'll just have to wait to see what happens with my career now...

Top 10 Reason For The Church Of You & Me

Here is my Top Ten list about the best reasons for Christians to simply live as the church body. That means having friends and helping each other grow, period. One of you may be mentoring or discipling the other, or you may simply be friends on an equal level.

The important thing is not the forum, it's the one-on-one time with each other. You can both be involved in Alpha programs, or cell groups, or Bible studies, or be members of a local church congregation, or play on a band together, or do a soup kitchen ministry together. You can have a mutual friend or two that is equally import to both of you.

As long as those things never take precedance over your one-on-one time then it's all good and will hopefully serve to enhance your growth. As long as the forum does not become a requirement and a rule, the relationship can thrive regardless. So you don't have to be a member of a local church and you don't have to be involved in a ministry. However, you do need to have Christian and non-Christian relationships, and you do need to use your gifts and talents, and you do need to reach out to people. It's just that the format for these things is really, really flexible.

So here is my Top Ten list of the benfits of this "Church of You and Me..."

1. Everyone Needs a Friend
That's a simple truth. Everyone needs a friend and no one wants to feel like they're alone. Someone to laugh and cry with, someone that gives to us and one to whom we can give. There are so many people, of all ages, in all walks of life, inside and outside of the local church, that do not have that kind of close friendship. We all need a friend, and I'm always shocked at how many people don't even have one close friend.

2. No Restrictions on Leadership
Depending on your theological flavour, your personal beliefs and your Christian denomination, you may accept certain restrictions in a local church setting. Some churches will not allow women to teach or preach, some will not allow single men to become elders, some will not allow people without pastoral credentials to give a sermon. However, these restrictions don't even apply if you're simply being friends with someone. Any woman can be a friend to another woman and can mentor them. No credentials or formal training required, just be a friend.

3. Everyone Should Lead
This is the positive flip side of the point above. Not only are there no restrictions on simply developing good friendships, but everyone should do this. (BOCTAOE) All Christians, regardless of maturity and age, can always come alongside someone else. And whether or not you call yourself a mentor officially, this is always the way to grow as a leader and mature. And in my experience, the most dynmaic growth in our own lives comes when we are trying to help others grow.

4. The Body Grows
As my dad said in this post, bringing one friend to salvation every few years isn't too hard. It can be a family member, a coworker, a classmate, anyone that you hang with. And if we do this, the Christian body would grow far more quickly than the rate we now see in North America. (And as bonus, you can still be a member of a local church, you just can't expect the local church to do your ministry for you.)

5. Meet The Need
Since this is all based on friendship, you will hopefully know what is going on in the other person's life. You will know their struggles, whether it's physical or emotional or whatever. And as their friend, you want to help. That might mean kicking in a few bucks to help with school, or inviting them over for dinner. It's simple. You may not be able to meet every need directly by yourself but even then you'll be sure to stand with your friend and support them.

6. Meet The Needs
As an extension of the above point, it can be even easier to meet the needs of a wider circle of friends. So much of our money is normally devoted to tithing, paying the pastors and paying the monthly bills of the local church. If this same money is instead directed to people you know personally, or friends-of-friends, it multiplies it's effectiveness. Just do the math. Take the amount of money that ten people give to the local church in a year and give that directly to friends in need, and the results are tenfold. (To be fair, there are certain things a local church can do much more easily, like planning foreign missions trips or large-scale ministries, but even these I have seen done on an individual basis.)

7. Anywhere
If you live in a tiny town in northern Ontario and you can't afford to build a church and hire a pastor, that's fine since you're just looking to build Christian friendships. If you live in modern-day Russia or China and your local pastor is put into prison and your church congregation is persecuted, you can handle it because it's all based on one-on-one friendships anyway. If you're a missionary heading into a strange part of the world, it's fine if there is no one that speaks English and there is no church, because your goal is to find a friend and lead them to Christ. Friendships work anywhere and everywhere.

8. Anytime
What about the person that works constant night shifts? What about the mother of two infant kids? What about the student that has to go to school full time and has to work full time? No problem. Friends always make time for friends.

9. It's All About Me
Not to be arrogant or selfish, but we can always grow in ways that we need to grow. If we're struggling with something, or we're curious about something, or we want to experience something new, we can go ahead and focus on that. We don't have to listen to weekly sermons that may or may not have much to do with our lives, though we may still prefer to do that through the internet or in a Sunday service. Granted, we need to ensure that we have somebody speaking new things to us and challenging us, otherwise we can get stuck in a rut of always dealing with the same issues and never exploring new areas. The key here is that the ministry that we give and receive is uniquely personalized to us.

10. We're Already Doing It
The most unassuming reason for this is the fact that we're already doing it. Hopefully, we already have a desire for close friends and we already spend time on those friendships. The difference is that we now make this the priority and all of the other aspects of modern Christian life become secondary, which is often not the case these days for church members. Playing on the music team should be secondary to being there for a friend in need. Attending a Sunday service should be less important than coffee with a friend. If we can balance different things like that then good for us, no need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. The most important thing is that we always ensure that our friends are the most important part of our Christian lives.

The Church Of You & Me: Context

Previously, I posted the Top 10 Reasons For A Big Church. This was in response to my dad's blog post in which he mockingly did the same. However, I am genuinely a fan of both big and small churches. I think that they each offer different advantages and disadvantages related to the number of people in the church.

I've been a member of maybe a dozen churches throughout my lifetime, usually changing churches only when my family moved or when the church closed. Several of those churches had between forty and eighty people, and a few had upwards of one thousand people. Regardless, I was equally involved in the music ministry in each place, and I was often involved in many other areas like youth ministry and small groups. And speaking of small groups, I've been a member of five different cell groups for most of the past ten years, including leading one such group for two and a half years

When we suggest that 90% of the ministry in a church is done by 10% of the people, I was always in that 10%. Spending 20+ hours at church in any given week is not abnormal for me, it's always been my habit. And you know what? I never regretted any of it. I always loved being heavily involved in church, using my gifts and talents for God and to minister to people. I'm a big, big fan of church.

I say all of this in order to supply the context for this next post...

Taken 4 Granted

My dad has been blogging for a number of months now, often focusing on how the institution of Sunday Services and the local church building actually inhibits and restricts real growth and life in the Christian body. Given my experience over the years, I am increasingly persuaded to agree with this idea. I want to summarize a few of his key points to save y'all the trouble of reading his stuff.

Persecuted For...
If the Christian church is actually persecuted, as it is now in Russia, the simplest solution is to go underground and only have small groups. There is no need for formal church congregations and buildings.

The Cycle of Church Life
Small groups of Christians will thrive and grow, become larger, slowly stop growing and eventually fade away or split. And then this cycle repeats itself...why not stay small and multiply the groups instead? Why repeat this pattern of slow decay?

Why Do You?
Why do we go to a local church? Because the church tells us we should, not because the Bible does. It's a teaching that feeds on itself.

Bill Hybels and I Agree
Willowcreek, the megachurch, did surveys and found no correlation between the church programs and long-term growth and discipleship for Christians. The local church congregation is not as useful as we like to think.

Aftermath!
If we lead only one person to Christ every four years, and those people do the same, we will see explosive growth. It's not too hard to do, and it's way more effective than the statistical growth of the local church.

Is Christ Divided?
Why does the local church need a name, or a building? That ain't in the Bible.

Scattered
In the Old Testament, people demand a king. In modern times, people demand a pastor. Missionaries get by just fine without a pastor.

Empowerment?
We say that we want people to be active as Christians, but if they contradict the ideas of the local church body they'll find that they eventually have to leave the group. The group itself is more important than individuals.

Living Relationally
An oxymoron: The Relational Church. Wayne Jocobsen has a story that illustrates how poorly the local church does in teaching and developing individuals.

Jesus Plus
Why do we feel the need for a local church congregation? Why do we add so much to Jesus, when Jesus himself is enough?

Hmm. Perhaps I will follow this up soon with a Top Ten list of the best reaons to not have a local church congregation...

Jury Duty

This past Tuesday, I had jury duty. I thought I would write up a bit about my experience just for the sake of curiousity. This is also for anyone who might be called for jury duty in London, Ontario in the future, if they want to know what they're getting into.

I arrived at the court house in downtown London at about 8:45 am for the 9:00 am session. Parking is something like $13.00 if you park at the courthouse, it's $7.00 about a block away and it's only $4.50 if you go three blocks south at the corner of King Street and Ridout. Yes, I chose the best parking spot and I got to brag about it a few times as everyone else complained about the price.

It's a good thing I arrived early at the courthouse. There was a long line of people waiting to go through the security checkin. We had to take everything out of our pockets, our bags were inspected and we had to go through a metal detector. Make sure you have extra time for that. Oh, and make sure you don't bring a drink in with you because it will get confiscated.

Once in, I took the elevator to the 14th floor. It's technically the 13th floor but such floors do not exist in some large buildings. This is where the main courtroom was situated for jury selections. I had my jury duty letter and I had to tear off the bottom portion, sign it and hand it in before I was admitted into the courtroom.

The courtroom seats about 200 spectators, just barely. On this day, we actually had two jury pools of 100 people each. The pool from the previous week had been cancelled and it was deferred to this week with my pool. At around 9:30 am, a lawyer-or-somebody-official came out and informed us that we would have two jury selections, one in the morning and one in the afternoon with a 1.5 hour break for lunch.

The lawyer-or-somebody-official then proceeded with rollcall. He went through two giant stacks of computer-generated cards, verifying that everyone was present. He worked hard to keep things lively, cracking jokes and referencing old names and businesses that he knew. At one point, he asked if one lady knew of so-and-so. The lady answered yes, that was her sister. And the lawyer-or-other responded and said that he had been married to that sister, much to the woman's surprise! Small world...

The lawyer-or-other also used this time to clarify the occupation of each person. Something like "manager" or "sales" had to be made more specific. As an example, he said that defense lawyers in a trial for a bank robbery may not want a bank manager in the jury. And while in civil cases a jury might be random, in this criminal case the lawyers had a finite number of vetoes regarding jury selection.

By coincidence, one of my friends happened to be in this jury pool with me and he sat down just two seats behind me. Nick Hourd had been in the pool for the previous week and now he was joining me in this selection. Interesting occurence, considering that I was hanging out with him the previous Friday. So later on, we got the chance to sit together and quietly crack jokes like those two guys on The Muppet Show.

At around 10:30 pm, the judge and the lawyers and the court officials and the cops and the defendant all came into the courtroom. "All rise...something, something...Queen and Britain...please sit down." Then they read the charges in this first case against the defendant. There were two charges, one for 2nd degree murder and one for arson. Based on that, it would seem that this guy was accused of lighting a house on fire on June 1 2006, thereby killing a woman that had been inside. The defendant then gave his plea for each charge, pleading guilty for the fire thing and not guilty for the worse thing.

After that, they stuck all of the jury cards into a big bingo spinner and mixed 'em all up. They pulled out twenty cards and had everyone come up one at a time as their name was called. After four or five people were lined up at the front, the judge explained (for a second time) that they were supposed to talk to the judge as they came forward if they had any good reason to be excluded from jury duty. Immediately, most of the people that were lined up stepped forward and gave some excuse and they were excused, leaving just one person standing there.

They gradually called more and more people up until they had 20 people in line that were willing and able to do jury duty. The excuses that people had for exclusion were sometimes quite amusing. A few examples...

• One lady announced that she was turning 100 next year and preferred not to participate.
• Another lady's occupation was announced as "maternity leave." 'Nuff said.
• One guy said he had cancer was starting chemo and the judge was this close to making him stay anyway.
• A couple of people said that they recognized the accused or one of the lawyers or witnesses involved.
• There was one priest that was excused on religious grounds.
• A lot of people said they had business trips that were absolutely required, and some simply offered the fact that they couldn't afford the time off.
• One guy offered the poor excused of being important at work and not wanting to burden his co-workers. He was let off but then the judge gave everyone a lecture about how she realized that this was a burden to everyone but each potential juror had to prove that it was an "undue burden" if they wanted to the be excused.

Other than that, the minimum requirements for a juror are that:

• They can understand english very well - not just conversational english since a court case is intricate.
• They are a legal citizen of Canada.
• They have adequate hearing abilities.
• In this case, that they are available for approximately three weeks.

Once the line up of twenty potential jurors was set, each person was brought forward one at a time and they were told to look at the accused, and the accused was to look at them. Because this was a criminal case, the lawyers on each side had veto power to dismiss 12 potential people. The lawyers alternated, giving each side a chance to say "Content" or "Challenge" for each person. The lawyers took notes of each person and their occupation and it was an interesting little game of strategy. In the end, the jury seemed to be made of mostly of people that were 40 years old or older, with a few more men than women. It seemed to me the the lawyers were looking for people that seemed dispassionate and logical but that's just my opinion.

In the first set of names, about 40 people were called up and 20 or so were excused. Of these 20, only six were actually admitted to jury duty. After that, they gathered another line up of 10 people, then again a group of 5, and then another group of 5. So there were probably 100 or so names called in all form the jury pool to create a 12-member jury with two additional alternate members.

Once a jury member was agreed upon, they had the choice of swearing in or affirming. By swearing in, they held a Christian Bible and swore to uphold justice so help them God, or something like that. By affirming, the juror just had to promise real hard. Of the 14 jurors selected, only one man opted for affirmation. He was an awkward little asian guy that had trouble understanding the difference between affirming and swearing in. In the end, he simply said that he wanted to "stay away from the Bible," which I found quite amusing. I also thought that most of the people swearing by God was a little funny since I doubt that all 13 of those jurors were actually Christian.

So that was the end of that. All of the court-like people vacated the place and then the jury pool just sat around for another hour or so. We had the option of leaving at any time to go to the bathroom or to get a drink of water. And as the one lawyer-or-other guy said, the final jury members are "treated like gold" and they can get whatever they want, whether it's a bathroom break or a sandwich.

Time dragged on and it was well after 1:00 pm when somebody came back into the courtroom to announce that everyone could go home. We had been waiting to find out how long the lunch break was going to be but then the second courtcase was settled out of court around noon and they cancelled the whole thing. So we got out early, albeit quite hungry, and then Nick and I went out for a long and relaxing lunch.

All in all, 'twas a fascinating day. And this seemed like a fairly big trial with a lot at stake so that added to it all. Very serious stuff but I really enjoyed the experience.

Links & Blinks

Ashleigh has finally returned after being away for almost two months. She's still trying to catch up on all of the e-mail and facebook messages, but in the meantime she has managed to update her blog again.

If you want a tour-de-force, read this short story on Abe's blog as he describes himself watching the world die while he does nothing. Powerful images...

David Grant had this recent post about Willowcreek church. As one of the famous mega-churches, they just completed some intensive studies and discovered that their 30 years of church programs have no real correlation with a person deepening their relationship with God. By my estimation, people that want a deeper relationship with Christ will get it regardless of the church setting, and the average church attendee will just be satisfied with simply attending church. Do we just assume that church helps us grow, until someone pulls out the facts that say otherwise? And if church doesn't do the trick then what is the best environment?

There is some good, ongoing discussion on this recent post of mine. Is it enough to just make a buck at work, or do we expect more from our workplaces? As a manager, do we strive for satisfied and happy employees, or do we just expect people to do their jobs? Some interesting perspectives are popping up there...

As They Say In Zanzibar

And now for the return of my selection of proverbs from around the globe. My theme this time centres on rats and mice, for no particular reason. I chose some of these as truisms but others I chose primarily for the humour. The trick is interpreting all of these correctly.

When rats infest a palace a lame cat is better than the swiftest horse. China

The one who hunts two rats will catch neither. Uganda

A cat with mittens won't catch mice. Scotland

The cat who frightens the mice away is as good as the cat who eats them. Germany

The mouse is not crushed under the haystack. Scotland

The cat does not catch mice for God. India

When the mouse laughs at the cat, there is a hole. Gambia

It is a cunning mouse which nests in the cat's ear. England

Reference: As They Say In Zanzibar

Tit For Tat

I'm very much a 9-to-5 sort of guy. I come in on time and I leave on time. For many years at the beginning of my career, I actually despised the idea of working past 5:00:00 pm. That's right, down to the second. For me, leaving on time emphasized that my life outside of work, including my family and friends, was just as important or more important than my career. Workaholism was a dirty word to me and I really tried to avoid letting work take over my life.

The thing is, most employers tend to frown on this kind of behaviour. Employers want to see someone that is dedicated to the company, someone with ambition, someone willing to go that extra mile. They want happy customers and completed deadlines, and if that means taking an extra phone call at 4:58 PM or coming in on a weekend then so be it. Employers want a team player, someone personally invested in the company, someone they can count on.

It took me a long time to figure that out. So I gradually made small changes. Sticking around for an extra fifteen minutes made me look good even if little was happening. I still made a point of leaving at five o-clock regularly but I also made myself available when asked, and then I would advertise my extra work a little bit to the managers. If I'm going work extra time, I want the credit for it at least.

I will even offer to work extra weekends provided that I am paid the expected overtime. Ah, but that's where things fall apart. Suddenly these looming priorities and impending emergencies can wait until Monday if we have to pay time and a half to get them done. Money puts everything into perspective for a manager, it seems.

Companies, owners and managers want and expect employees to go that extra mile. And not only that, but not going the extra mile and sacrificing personal time is viewed poorly. It's a negative trait to refuse to work unpaid overtime or ten hour shifts.

The irony here is that these same companies will demand that everyone arrive on time at the start of the day. They will reprimand people that make personal calls or check their private e-mail. They will quell casual conversations between co-workers and split up teams that are too noisy. (And they usually don't realize that removing this freedom actually makes people work more poorly, not better.)

So companies place these demands on their employees and they often offer nothing in return. It's not a give-and-take proposition, it's a take-and-take deal. And if an employee challenges this, it's the employees reputation and standing that takes the hit.

As a manager and programmer, whenever I had deadlines looming I would make sure I got them done every time. Often enough, I would stay and work that extra Saturday shift in order to meet Monday's due date. I figured that was better than forcing my team to give up their weekend. As a by-product of setting that example, my team was then more willing to give up a few hours the odd Saturday every six months because they knew that I did it several times before for their sake. And as a manager, I tried to ensure that these types of extra shifts were not necessary in the first place because that would indicate poor planning from the start, so making a habit of it would be a systematic problem.

Companies can certainly have high expectations, I'm not disagreeing with that. However, companies need to offer something in return as well. If companies take-and-take, eventually the employee will have nothing left to give. Like strip mining a natural resource, the ground will be torn up. New ground and new people will be needed as the old people feel like they are forced to leave.

If we want to get the most from our employees, we need to give them something back.

Engagement Photos

This past week, Cam and I had our engagement photos done. We were supposed to visit our photographer in Toronto but the evening before we were informed that he had sprained his ankle and our plans were canceled. Our good friend Lori stepped in at the last minute and we managed to do an hour-long session at Pinafore Park in St. Thomas. Many thanks to Lori for that, she's been a great friend to both of us. And for your viewing pleasure, here is a selection of the many photos.

It was difficult for me to take my eyes off of Cam during our photo shoot. She is captivating to me...beautiful, beautiful.