My wife and I are huge fans of the TV series Angel that ended a few years ago. For those of you who don't know what show I'm talking about, the premise of the show is about a vampire named Angel who was cursed by Gypsies and given his soul back. After that event, he began spending the rest of his existence trying to gain atonement for the wrongs he had done.

There was an episode in Season 3 of the show in which Angel learns that an old "friend" of his is now in L.A. with him. During one of the scenes, the two of them have a conversation in which the friend says that while Angel has been merely "existing" for 200 hundred years, this guy has been "living."

I guess I could kinda say the same thing. Obviously I'm not a vampire (or am I???) so I haven' t been alive (or dead in that case) for 200 years. But relatively speaking, I've been a Christian for a very long time.

As I thought on that conversation, I began asking myself, "Am I living or merely existing? Am I truly living in the fullness of God or am I just going about my life simply existing?"

If I'm honest with myself, that's an easy question to answer. If you haven't guessed it by now, then I'll help you out. The answer is existing.

The hard part is figuring out how to change that. See, I'm fairly laid back and very easy going. It's quite simple for me to let my life slip into "cruise control." Unless something makes me hit the brakes then I'm very content to just continue going down the path I'm on.

So that's where I'm at in my life right now. I'll be taking the next few weeks to figure out how I can change from simply existing and get back to living.

Until next time...

I guess I could break my weekend down to 3 different sections, Marriage Seminar, UK vs Florida, and Angel. I think I'll start in reverse order.

We spent a good deal of time watching Season 2 of Angel on DVD yesterday. There is a group of us at the office that watch Angel, as well as Buffy and Smallville, during our lunch break. It really helps break up the day and takes your mind off of work for a small while anyway. So, after watching a few episodes of Angel I became hooked. During the holidays, Best Buy had each season of Angel on sale for $19.99 each. I snatched up a copy of all five seasons! My wife had never seen it but I just knew that she was going to like it. Sure enough, at some point during Season 1 she became hooked like me. We've actually caught up and passed the point where the office group is at.

Then on Saturday night, I watched the UK vs Florida game. UK lost 64-61, but they SHOULD have won the game. Prior to the last minute, they had their worst 3-pt shooting night of the season. At one point they were 1-19 from behind the arc. They finished 3-22, with the last attempt coming up just short and hitting the front of the rim. Had that shot went it, Rupp Arena would have gone just nuts! But alas, it didn't. And Florida won... again... for the 5th time in a row against us. It's the second time that's ever happened to UK. And if we can't pull off the upset on March 4th, then Florida will do something that no other team has EVER done, beat us 6 games in a row.

I think our best shot to beat them was on Saturday, but I think they have a shot to pull off the upset down the road. They played well except the fact that they didn't shoot well. Some of that was a credit to Florida's defense. But a lot of that was UK simply not hitting their open looks. Florida should feel very fortunate to get the win. Case and point... Ramel Bradley, the SEC leader in Free Throw percentage, missed 6 FT's during the game. He hadn't missed more than 2 in a game all season. If he hits his average, UK wins the game.

Prior to that game, my wife and I spent the rest of the day going through a marriage seminar on DVD. It was put together by a Christian company, Family Dynamics Institute, but I wasn't quite sure what to expect out of it. In the end, I'm glad we went through it. It definitely opened up some doors for conversation. Some of the stuff that was covered we had already worked through ourselves earlier in our marriage. I mean, you don't stay married for over 10 and a half years without learning how to work through some stuff.

There was also a book that came with it that we started on, "Becoming One." We've read through the first two chapters so far. I expect that we'll finish it up over the next two weeks. So far it's been ok, but I expect it to get better.

All in all, the weekend went really good. I wish UK would have won, but the most important thing that happened was my wife and I were able to reconnect.

Until next time...